Preamble

The House met at half-past Two o'clock

PRAYERS

[MR. SPEAKER in the Chair]

PRIVATE BUSINESS

MERSEY DOCKS AND HARBOUR BILL [Lords] (By Order)

Order for Third Reading read.

To be read the Third time on Thursday 5 March.

ALLIANCE AND LEICESTER (GIROBANK) BILL (By Order)

BRITISH RAILWAYS (No. 4) BILL (By Order)

CROSSRAIL BILL (By Order)

EAST COAST MAIN LINE SAFETY BILL (By Order)

KING'S CROSS RAILWAYS (No. 2) BILL (By Order)

LONDON DOCKLANDS RAILWAY (LEWISHAM, ETC.) (No. 2) BILL (By Order)

LONDON UNDERGROUND (GREEN PARK) BILL (By Order)

LONDON UNDERGROUND (JUBILEE) BILL (By Order)

Orders for Second Reading read.

To be read the Second time on Thursday 5 March.

ABERDEEN HARBOUR ORDER CONFIRMATION BILL

Read the Third time, and passed.

Oral Answers to Questions — NORTHERN IRELAND

Banbridge Hospital

1. Mr. Trimble: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what guidance the management executive of the Department of Health and Social Services has recently given to the Southern health and social services board concerning the future of Banbridge hospital.

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr. Jeremy Hanley): None, Sir. The hon. Gentleman might be referring to the fact that on receipt of the Southern board's investment appraisal for the refurbishment of Banbridge hospital it became clear that there were a number of deficiencies in the document, as certain issues had not been properly addressed. The board has simply been asked to provide that information before I can make a decision.

Mr. Trimble: The Minister knows of the concern about the future of Banbridge hospital and knows that, for many years, the Southern board promised its refurbishment. That project was finally put into the proposals for this financial year, only to be clobbered by the moratorium on capital expenditure. As the Minister said, his Department wrote to the board in January to tell it that it should reconsider "the issue of Banbridge". It also supplied to the board a momorandum which has not been made available to other people. Is not the implication obvious? The hon. Gentleman is asking the board either to run down or to close the hospital. Is not that a consequence of the need to provide up to £15 million to cure the concrete cancer problem at Craigavon? What other hospitals will be affected? Why cannot that exceptional expense be met with exceptional funding?

Mr. Hanley: I am doing no such thing. The hon. Gentleman will know that any project in excess of £1 million must come to me for a decision. An investment appraisal comes with the project. The investment appraisal published by the Southern board was deficient in many respects. The board has a commitment to Banbridge hospital and to continuing health care and social services in its area. I merely want the information upon which I can decide whether refurbishment can go ahead. Therefore, there is no lack of commitment by the board or by me.

Security

Sir Patrick Duffy: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on the security situation in Northern Ireland.

Mr. Hunter: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a further statement on the security situation in Northern Ireland.

The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr. Peter Brooke): My last statement to the House followed the deaths of nine people on 4 and 5 February. Since then


there have been five deaths as a result of the security situation, including four men shot by the security forces near Coalisland on 16 February.
The Government and security forces will continue to meet their responsibility to bring terrorism to an end within the rule of law by pursuing a firm and resolute security policy and by working for progress in the political, economic and social fields.

Sir Patrick Duffy: Does the Secretary of State accept that the security forces must not only act within the law but always be clearly seen to act within it if they are to deprive the terrorist group of the environment in which it thrives? Will he therefore ensure that after any incident involving the use of lethal force there is a prompt, thorough and impartial investigation so that the facts are plain to see?

Mr. Brooke: I am most grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his statement and endorsement of the policy under which the security arrangements are conducted within the Province and for his reference to the rule of law. I assure him that after each such incident the Royal Ulster Constabulary investigates the circumstances.

Mr. Hunter: Will my right hon. Friend give serious consideration to the introduction of short-term selective internment? At a time of heightened terrorist activity, would not that undermine the operational effectiveness of the terrorists and play havoc with their planned acts of violence?

Mr. Brooke: My hon. Friend is right to point out that the powers of executive detention are on the statute book and are available for use. We do not comment further on them, beyond the fact that they are available for use.

Mr. Maginnis: Was not the Secretary of State a little disappointed at the reaction of some Church leaders to the successful contact by the security forces at Coalisland? Is not it important that the Northern Ireland Office should ensure that full information is available to the public on the extent of the deadly arsenal that the terrorists had with them on that occasion, which included AK47 assault rifles and Dsh heavy machine-guns?
Will the Secretary of State ensure that the public are aware that 12 dedicated terrorists were involved in that attack and, although no one glories in anyone's death, make it clear again that only four were shot? Does not that show that the security forces acted with remarkable restraint and that there is no dedicated shoot-to-kill policy?

Mr. Brooke: I support the hon. Gentleman's observations on the need for the circumstances of such cases to be made known. I do not think that there were any doubts in Northern Ireland about the circumstances of that case. The four men who were killed were sent on a murder mission. It is easy to assess their potential for action and their intent from their fire power, to which the hon. Gentleman referred.

Mr. Peter Robinson: Does the Secretary of State recall a speech that he made several months ago in which he encouraged the business community to take on racketeers? Does he recall that he said that if the business community took the first step he and the police would give it whatever support and back-up it needed? Is he aware that one business man did as he suggested and, as a result of his

coming forward, three people were convicted of racketeering? However, that business man was forced to close his business, change his name and go into hiding with his wife and two children, and he has received no financial support from the Northern Ireland Office. Despite the sympathy expressed by the judge in court, there is no way in which that business man can legally make a claim against the Northern Ireland Office. Will the Secretary of State ensure that his Department backs up his promises to the business community and ensure that such disincentives to the business community coming forward are not allowed to continue?

Mr. Brooke: I know that the hon. Gentleman supports our drive to deprive the paramilitaries on both sides of the sources of finance that sustain their campaigns. I recall the speech to which the hon. Gentleman referred and I know that he has referred before to a case similar to that which he described today. I confess that I thought that that case had arisen a little before that speech. If the hon. Gentleman wishes to write to me about the details of the case to which he referred I shall be happy to respond.

Mr. Mallon: When a Government have a serious problem that has lasted 22 years, cost billions of pounds in security and military provisions and caused immeasurable suffering to some people, it is reasonable to assume that they have a long-term policy for creating lasting peace and ending the waste. As we come to the end of this Parliament, will the Secretary of State take this opportunity to give us some insight into the Government's long-term policy which has been formulated during the past 13 years? I am not referring to ad hoc arrangements or short-term palliatives. Will the Secretary of State give an unambiguous statement of the Government's long-term policy for creating peace in Northern Ireland?

Mr. Brooke: As the hon. Gentleman implied by his question, the Government's central purpose must be to bring terrorism to an end. Terrorism will come to an end when the terrorist no longer believes that he has any chance of securing his objective by the means that he is using. That calls for a robust security policy to enable the people of Northern Ireland to live normal lives conducted within the rule of law. But it also implies, as my answer to the hon. Member for Sheffield, Attercliffe (Sir P. Duffy) stated, Government policy in political, economic and social matters that deprives the terrorist of the support which he might otherwise have enjoyed.

Political Talks

Mr. Canavan: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whether he will make a statement about his recent efforts to have talks with representatives of political parties in Northern Ireland.

Mr. John Greenway: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a further statement on the efforts he is making to reconvene all-party talks on the future government of Northern Ireland.

Mr. Brooke: The Prime Minister, the Minister of State and I met the leaders of the four main constitutional parties in Northern Ireland on 11 February. As a result of that meeting, the leaders agreed to meet together to discuss


the obstacles in the way of further political dialogue in the hope that new talks might be able to begin at an early date. I shall meet them again shortly.

Mr. Canavan: Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that if the killing is to be stopped and a just and peaceful solution is to be found, all politicians, whatever their views, have a responsibility to speak to each other? Does he further agree that, sooner or later, the talks will have to develop into meaningful discussions about constitutional change on an all-Ireland basis because the status quo is untenable and is a recipe for continuing conflict?

Mr. Brooke: I endorse what the hon. Gentleman says about the responsibility that politicians of all constitutional parties have, and a willingness so to talk has been very much present in recent years. As for his comments about all-Ireland talks, the talks on which we have been engaged, and to which we hope to return, contain more than one strand. The second strand involves the Government of the Republic and it has been a pleasure to all concerned that everybody involved in those talks has supported and sustained them.

Mr. Greenway: I take this opportunity to pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for all the work that he has done in the past two and a half years to improve the future and administration of Northern Ireland. Does he agree that the future economic prosperity of the area depends primarily on the defeat of terrorism and that terrorism will not be defeated until all political parties in the Province renounce violence—not just those represented in the House today but Sinn Fein?

Mr. Brooke: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his comments about the policies that we have been pursuing and economic prosperity in the Province, where we have seen advances in recent years. Our immediate agenda must be the talks on which we embarked last year. Everybody concerned has expressed an interest in returning to them.

Mr. Molyneaux: Does the Secretary of State agree that the progress made thus far is more likely to be maintained through calm deliberation than high wire circus acts'? Will he convey to the Prime Minister what I know to be the view of the three party leaders who represent Northern Ireland in the House—that we are endeavouring diligently to meet the wishes that he expressed at the Downing street meeting on 11 February?

Mr. Brooke: I endorse what the right hon. Gentleman said about the progress that has been made so far. All of us, during the time that we have been directly engaged in these matters, have found it easier to make progress when the media have not been looking over our shoulders and breathing on the backs of our necks. I mean no disrespect to the media, but some matters are carried forward more easily with the calm deliberation that the right hon. Gentleman described.

Mr. Kilfedder: I draw the attention of the Secretary of State to a damaging allegation made last week by the chairman of the Northern Ireland Conservative party and its prospective parliamentary candidate for North Down that the Secretary of State, by initiating talks between unionists and nationalists, provided the greatest possible encouragement for the murderous IRA campaign. Will the right hon. Gentleman bluntly refute the despicable

accusation that those taking part in the talks are responsible for the deaths of innocent people at the hands of the IRA?

Mr. Brooke: The hon. Gentleman knows well his opponent, the Conservative prospective parliamentary candidate. I enjoy my conversations with that gentleman as much as I do those that I have with right hon. and hon. Members.

Mr. Rees: As to strand 2—the north-south strand—of the talks to which the Secretary of State referred, the new Taoiseach announced that articles 2 and 3 would be on the table, and we all understand that. He said also that the Government of Ireland Act 1920 would be on the table. I studied it carefully this monring, better to understand what is involved. What has the Taoiseach said about that aspect that we can consider?

Mr. Brooke: Under the terms of my statement to the House of 26 March 1991, which set in motion the talks that we held, it is open to any party to raise any issues—including constitutional issues—that it considers relevant. However, the outcome of the talks will depend on securing agreement, and all concerned accept the principle that any change to Northern Ireland's status as part of the United Kingdom would come about only with the consent of a majority of the people who live there.

Rev. Ian Paisley: Is the Secretary of State confirming by that last statement that the union can be negotiated only by the House, the people of Northern Ireland and Her Majesty's Government—and that that matter is no concern of Mr. Reynolds or of the foreign state to the south of Northern Ireland? Is the right hon. Gentleman confirming that today? My hon. Friend the Member for Belfast, East (Mr. Robinson) and I understood that the basis of the talks was to try to secure a replacement for the Anglo-Irish Agreement and to make arrangements to safeguard the administration of Northern Ireland within the United Kingdom.

Mr. Brooke: At last night's meeting, the Taoiseach confirmed his Government's continuing commitment to the Anglo-Irish Agreement, article 1 of which contains a clear statement of Northern Ireland's constitutional status.

Mr. McNamara: Is the Secretary of State aware that the Opposition welcome the statements made by the Prime Minister and the Taoiseach at last night's meeting, on the future progress of talks between the two Governments, and that Northern Ireland will be high on their agenda —as it will on the agenda of the Labour Government? We are pleased that Northern Ireland party leaders agreed to meet to discuss the possibilities of progress. Does the Secretary of State accept that the Opposition hope very much that, after years of violence and despair, a political settlement will emerge, and that we will do everything in our power to achieve such an outcome, based on the three strands agreement?

Mr. Brooke: The hon. Gentleman and I have had similar exchanges before across the Dispatch Box, when he has advanced that bizarre and extraordinary hypothesis. I agree that the hon. Gentleman has supported the talks as they are conducted at present. If the hon. Gentleman's


extraordinary and bizarre hypothesis were to come to pass, I would—as I have said before—be supportive of his efforts.

Small Firms

Mr. Bellingham: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what recent representations he has received from the Northern Ireland business community in connection with small firms.

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr. Richard Needham): Since the beginning of the year, I have continued both to meet and to correspond with a wide cross-section of the Northern Ireland business community. Among the issues that we have addressed have been a number of particular concern to small firms.

Mr. Bellingham: Further to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway), I pay tribute to the Minister's work in supporting industry and business in the Province. Does he agree that one of the best ways of breaking down violence and lessening the sectarian divide is to encourage enterprise and initiative? Am I right in saying that Northern Ireland has weathered the recession better than any other part of the United Kingdom? If so, is not that due partly to the Government's support for small firms?

Mr. Needham: I thank my hon. Friend for his kind comments. The fact that Northern Ireland has weathered the recession better than any other region in the United Kingdom is due, to an extent, to the Government's policies; but it is due not least to the resourcefulness, intelligence and dedication of business people in Northern Ireland.
I was interested to learn this week that, whereas National Westminster bank—the parent of Ulster bank —had to make provision for £1·9 billion of bad debts, the figure for Northern Ireland was £6 million and that half the bank's profits came from Ulster bank. That shows beyond peradventure the current strength of the Northern Ireland economy. I am sure that, once the recession is over, it will continue to expand, and expand fast.

Mr. A. Cecil Walker: Is the Minister aware that the Department of the Environment has undertaken a surreptitious exercise in an attempt to destroy the private sector taxi service in Belfast? If so, can he tell us how much money has been allocated to that exercise?

Mr. Needham: I know of no surreptitious exercise being carried out by my Department in regard to private taxi firms in Belfast. The hon. Gentleman and I have engaged in lengthy discussions about the problems faced by Belfast taxi drivers and I fully appreciate their fears and concerns. I shall continue to discuss, with the hon. Gentleman and with the taxi drivers, whatever measures need to be taken to ensure their safety and continue their employment.

Mr. McGrady: In 1990–91, only 44 jobs were created in Northern Ireland. Will the Minister reconsider the wisdom of the policy change introduced a couple of years ago by the Local Enterprise Development Unit to endorse and support market research and development, rather than providing direct grant aid for job creation? That contradicted the philosophy, which proved correct, that

small jobs—one or two-person start-ups—were the way in which to tackle, at least in part, the problem caused by the lack of inward investment.
Will the Minister address himself to LEDU's policy, and consider the reintroduction of direct aid for people starting up in business? I know that LEDU does a good job through its local enterprise development programmes, but will the hon. Gentleman consider returning to the previous policy?

Mr. Needham: I really do not know where the hon. Gentleman found the "44" figure. Perhaps he is referring to some figures that were leaked a couple of weeks ago from the Industrial Development Board for Northern Ireland—a reference to 44 inward investment jobs. That figure turned out to be wrong: at least another 350 jobs have already been announced, involving no financial assistance. I hope that, within the next few weeks, several hundred more jobs will be announced by the board.
That has nothing to do with LEDU. The key to the success of a small business lies in the skills and professionalism of its management, technicians and staff. LEDU is trying to ensure that small businesses have the marketing experience, the exporting know-how and the managerial capacity that they need in order to get going. The Government are not about to hand out dollops of money so that inexperienced people can buy complicated equipment that they then do not know how to use.

Rev. William McCrea: I am sure that the Minister realises that small business is the backbone of industry in my constituency of Mid-Ulster. Will he tell the House and my constituents what further incentives he can provide to ensure that small businesses are created and the economic blight is removed from my constituency?

Mr. Needham: The hon. Gentleman pays rightful tribute to small business, describing it as the economic backbone of his constituency. I assure him that the Government's support for LEDU, and the money with which they provide it, continue year on year to match the needs of small business. I can reassure the hon. Gentleman that that will continue. I hope to be able to discuss it further with him in the not-too-distant future.

Internment

Mr. Flannery: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what representations he has received calling for the introduction of internment without trial; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. Brooke: The Government have received a number of representations calling for the reintroduction of executive detention. They have also received representations from those opposed to such a step.
The power to introduce executive detention remains on the statute book and is capable of being exercised by the Government. I shall not comment further, except to say that the consequences of such a step would need to be very carefully weighed.

Mr. Flannery: Does the Secretary of State agree that the re-imposition of internment without trial would deepen and intensify an already terribly difficult situation? Does he recall that last time this occurred there was an immediate leap forward in terms of killing? We would face that again. Those who are asking for that—many voices,


including important voices, in Northern Ireland are asking for it—would create a situation for everybody in Northern Ireland that would be far worse than it is now and, God knows, it is bad enough at present.

Mr. Brooke: The fact that the Government retained executive detention on the statute book by a free act last year is an indication that the Government believe it to be important that the instrument should be available. The hon. Gentleman referred to the last time it occurred. There are occasions—perhaps the only occasions when I feel a mild sense of despair in dealing with the affairs of Northern Ireland—when I fear that others assume that all events in Irish history will always repeat themselves exactly. That is not the case—and it is because it is not the case that we are making progress in the way that we are.

Sir John Farr: Will my right hon. Friend assure the House that he will discard no weapon at all in the fight against terrorism—including internment, if necessary? Should it unfortunately prove necessary, will my right hon. Friend make arrangements for it possibly to be introduced without notice and simultaneously after consultation with the Government of the Republic of Ireland?

Mr. Brooke: By definition, the weapon has not been discarded, as it will remain on the statute book, with the renewal of the order, in terms of the life of the statute. Clearly and patently, if it were to be introduced, it would be introduced without notice. There have been commentators who have said that if it were introduced, it would be much more effective if it were introduced throughout the island.

Mr. McNamara: Has the Secretary of State discussed the matter with the Government of the Republic of Ireland? Does he accept that internment would be the height of folly and would have no support at all from the Labour party? Will he also point out to those advocating such a foolish policy that they are merely diverting attention from the villainous crimes of the terrorists and, perhaps more importantly, from the enormous successes of the security forces and thus undermining confidence in the rule of law? The right hon. Gentleman has pointed out in the House that nearly 50 per cent. of people convicted of terrorist offences had no previous intelligence tracings in terms of involvement with terrorist organisations. Does he agree that always the best thing to do is to arrest, produce evidence, convict and put terrorists behind bars?

Mr. Brooke: The only matters that I discuss with Irish Ministers in intergovernmental conferences under the Anglo-Irish Agreement are those which can be discussed under the rules of the agreement. It would be a mistake, however, to think that we do not cover extensively all the ground and territory that is available within those limits. As to the rest of the hon. Gentleman's question, I said at the beginning that I thought the less said the better.

Castle Court

Mr. Harry Barnes: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what assistance was given by his Department to traders whose businesses were disrupted by the Castle Court development in Belfast.

Mr. Needham: Following representations from local traders about the disruption to their businesses, rates on

properties in the surrounding streets were reduced by up to one third. Belfast city council reduced rents in Smithfield market by a similar proportion.

Mr. Barnes: Glowing remarks were made earlier about small businesses in Northern Ireland. I know that the Minister has met Mr. Thomas Lennon, whose business was seriously disrupted during the Castle Court development, as were the businesses of other small business men in the area. A rates reduction for a certain period is inadequate to compensate for the great disruption that was caused to people seeking to make a living in that area—people who do not have the wherewithal or the ability to use the court system against the Minister. Why does he not face up to his responsibility and see that adequate compensation is given to the people who suffered so badly during that development?

Mr. Needham: Mr. Lennon's rates were reduced by a third. The best news that Mr. Lennon can have is that the Castle Court complex now employs some 2,500 people. It has brought into that area of Belfast a vast number of new businesses and has revitalised that area of the town. The traders who trade around it can do nothing but benefit from the new multi-storey car park with 1,600 spaces. The best thing that could happen for Mr. Lennon and his friends would be if the military wing of Sinn Fein stopped trying to blow up Belfast.

Mr. John D. Taylor: Despite the major differences between the Conservative party and the Ulster Unionist party following the imposition by the Conservative party of the Anglo-Irish Agreement and partial Dublin rule through Stormont, will the Minister accept on a personal level that there is widespread respect throughout Northern Ireland for the contribution that he has made to the rejuvenation of Royal avenue in our capital city of Belfast? Does he recognise that it is one of the commercial miracles of Northern Ireland and is now envied by many areas in the United Kingdom? Should he not be with us in six weeks, will he leave a message for his successor to ensure the continuation of that economic miracle into York street and York road in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Belfast, North (Mr. Walker)?

Mr. Needham: I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his kind words. It will not stop at Belfast. It is spreading to Derry, Newry, Armagh, Carrickfergus and Ballymoney, and throughout the length and breadth of Northern Ireland. The people, the councillors and the business community of Northern Ireland are coming together to create their own economic future and to undermine the men of violence on either side. They know that their success will lead to the defeat of the paramilitaries. The people of Northern Ireland continue to need to be congratulated on their determination and resilience.

Hospital Waiting Lists

Mr. Stevens: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what initiatives are being taken to reduce hospital waiting lists in Northern Ireland.

Mr. Hanley: From 1 April this year, the vast majority of patients will be guaranteed admission to hospital within two years of being placed on a hospital waiting list. Special task forces have been at work in each board to deal with


the longest waiting lists and I have set aside an extra £1 million this year and in each of the next two years to support their work.

Mr. Stevens: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that reply, which I am sure will be welcome to the people of Northern Ireland. I hope that there will be the same success in cutting waiting lists in Northern Ireland as we have seen in other parts of the United Kingdom. I know that my hon. Friend is aware that the waiting list for treatment of coronary disease has been a matter of concern in Northern Ireland. What action has he taken to deal with that specific waiting list?

Mr. Hanley: My hon. Friend is right. Unfortunately, Northern Ireland suffers from one of the worst rates of coronary heart disease. Following completion of the £1·5 million extension to the cardiac care recovery unit at the Royal Victoria hospital at the end of last year, a fourth cardiac surgeon has now been appointed there. The new surgeon, a locum, will take up his post on 1 May this year for an initial period of one year. That will lead to an increase in the number of operations at the Royal. In addition, the Eastern and Western boards have already begun to buy in cardiac operations from Great Britain this year and the Northern and Southern boards are expected to do likewise shortly. I hope that the waiting list for cardiac surgery will reduce greatly over the next year.

Mr. Beggs: Does the Minister accept that patients, irrespective of age group, should not have to undergo prolonged suffering, being fobbed off with medication from time to time when cardiac surgery is necessary? Will he urgently encourage all boards to purchase coronary artery bypass surgery and other cardiac surgery from Great Britain?

Mr. Hanley: The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right and I agree with every word he says. Cardiac surgery has the longest waiting list in Northern Ireland, but every effort is being made to reduce it, including the purchase of operations in Britain. I believe that great progress will be made.

Sir Michael McNair-Wilson: In considering hospital waiting lists, is my hon. Friend satisfied that all those who would benefit from renal replacement therapy are getting it and has he anything to announce about a possible new satellite dialysis unit for the Province?

Mr. Hanley: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that question. I am afraid that he is right: not everybody is benefiting from kidney replacement, because there is a shortage of kidney donors. We could probably carry out about 70 more operations a year if there were more donors. I therefore launched the donor card again last week. I hope that every hon. Member, and everyone in Northern Ireland, will carry a donor card; it is vital that people do so.

Hospital Trusts

Rev. Martin Smyth: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what assessment has been made of the adverse effect on maintaining and upgrading hospitals of the amount being spent in preparing hospital trusts.

Mr. Hanley: It has always been made clear that the Government's reforms are not to be introduced at the

expense of patient and client care. Additional funds have been made available for the purpose and, accordingly, the reforms—including the establishment of trusts—cause no adverse effects on the hospital maintenance programme.

Rev. Martin Smyth: The Minister's comments may be helpful in the House, but they will not allay the concern that has been expressed throughout Northern Ireland—for example, in Upper Bann—about the amount of money that is needed to deal with the problem of concrete cancer at Craigavon hospital. Will he acknowledge that even those who are trying to implement hospital trusts are concerned that the dead hand of bureaucracy, which has increased, is hindering their work?

Mr. Hanley: The hon. Gentleman makes a serious point about concrete cancer and money will have to be found to deal with that in due course. I assure him that the money spent on the health reforms will lead to greater efficiencies and savings—its purpose is to improve patient care and to increase the number of patients treated—and it is extra to the maintenance programme. I am pleased to say that, as from yesterday, 11 new hospital and social service organisation units applied for hospital trust status in Northern Ireland. They recognise the advantages that will flow from trust status.

Mr. John Marshall: Will my hon. Friend confirm that NHS trust hospitals are treating many more patients than a year ago? Is it not perverse, therefore, that some people are suggesting that those hospital trusts should be wound up?

Mr. Hanley: I thoroughly agree that hospital trusts are proving their worth, but the national health service in Northern Ireland is succeeding with trusts even before they have been established. The establishment of trusts will improve matters. The total number of in-patients in Northern Ireland, including day cases, increased by 9 per cent. last year. The total number of operations increased by 15 per cent. and the total number of new out-patients by 6 per cent. With or without trusts, Northern Ireland is succeeding in health care. Trusts will make that even better.

Roads Maintenance

Mr. Clifford Forsythe: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what plans he has to increase the funds allocated to roads maintenance in the next financial year.

Mr. Needham: It is planned to increase funding for the operation and maintenance of roads, and associated bridges, in the 1992–93 financial year by £3·2 million to £65·3 million.

Mr. Forsythe: Does the Northern Ireland Office keep a record of unadopted roads not covered by bonds? What progress has been made in bringing those roads up to condition?

Mr. Needham: I think that the hon. Gentleman's colleague, the hon. Member for Antrim, North (Rev. Ian Paisley) came to see me about one of the cases to which he refers. All I can say is that the giving up of bonds on unadopted roads is not a matter with which I deal daily,


but I shall certainly consider the cases that the hon. Gentleman brings to my attention and see what can be done.

Mr. Hume: Is the Minister aware that when the Unionist party governed Northern Ireland it concentrated heavily on developing the roads only in the eastern part of Northern Ireland? It did an outstanding job there, but the state of roads in the western part where there are areas of high unemployment such as Derry, Tyrone and Fermanagh—as exemplified by the Derry to Strabane road —are still in need of urgent development. Will the Department give priority to the development of those roads in future planning?

Mr. Needham: I sympathise with the hon. Gentleman's point. I assure him that the highest priority will be given to developing those roads, within the budget by which we are currently constrained.

Security

Mr. Molyneaux: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on the security situation.

Mr. Brooke: I refer the right hon. Gentleman to the answer I gave earlier today to the hon. Member for Sheffield, Attercliffe (Sir P. Duffy).

Mr. Molyneaux: In view of the statement made by the Chief Constable of the Royal Ulster Constabulary that terrorist movements can be destroyed very effectively from within, will the Secretary of State consult his right hon. Friend the Prime Minister to ensure that the full weight of the intelligence services is brought to bear on all terrorist movements within the United Kingdom?

Mr. Brooke: In explaining that my hon. Friend the Minister of State is not present to answer questions because he is doing duty in the Province, I give the right hon. Gentleman an absolute assurance of the commitment of the intelligence services and of their relevance in Northern Ireland today.

Oral Answers to Questions — PRIME MINISTER

Engagements

Mr. Loyden: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 27 February.

The Prime Minister (Mr. John Major): This morning I presided at a meeting of the Cabinet and had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in the House, I shall be having further meetings later today.

Mr. Loyden: Will the Prime Minister come out of his ivory tower across the road, put his photo calls on hold and face up to his responsibility for the past 13 years of Government mismanagement, which has culminated in the worst economic crisis since the 1930s? How long must we go on, how many more jobs are to be lost and how many more families are to be dispossessed of their homes? Will the Prime Minister now put it to the test through the ballot box and let the people decide on his record?

The Prime Minister: It is the hon. Member who is wrong. We grew throughout the 1980s better than any other major European country except Spain: we received the highest growth in manufacturing productivity of any Group of Seven country and faster growth in business investment than any other G7 country except Japan. By contrast, the hon. Gentleman might bear it in mind that Labour's plans for an extra £37 billion a year and policies of higher taxation, higher inflation and higher interest rates would drive this country into perpetual slump.

Mr. Devlin: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 27 February.

The Prime Minister: I refer my hon. Friend to the reply that I gave some moments ago.

Mr. Devlin: Does my right hon. Friend agree that higher taxes and minimum wages would put up the costs of British businesses, making them uncompetitive and costing them jobs? Does he agree that such twin torture is the very last thing that British business needs at the moment?

The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Only the Labour party could plan to cripple industry with both a national minimum wage and substantial tax increases when trading conditions are so difficult. Let me give my hon. Friend a quote:
If our costs rise more rapidly than others' costs, particularly German costs, then British producers lose markets at home and abroad.
Those are not my words—they were the words of the Leader of the Opposition. If that is what he thinks, he should withdraw his tax plans and withdraw his minimum wage plans and do so today.

Mr. Kinnock: Does the Prime Minister recall saying that a
promise … to cut taxes AND increase public expenditure … is dishonest and absurd"?
When the right hon. Gentleman wrote that, did he think that he would end up making exactly that "dishonest and absurd" promise himself?

The Prime Minister: It is quite staggering to everyone who listens to the right hon. Member for Islwyn (Mr. Kinnock) how terrified he and his party are of tax cuts. He still thinks that tax cuts are immoral. The Labour party has opposed every tax cut that we have introduced and now it threatens to raise taxes if we cut them. The right hon. Gentleman wants people to let him spend their money rather than spending it themselves. Labour opposes tax cuts when the economy is growing and when it is not.

Mr. Kinnock: The Prime Minister heads the Government who have imposed the biggest tax burden in British history. Perhaps he will now try answering the question. The Government have promised to increase public expenditure and are promising to cut income taxes. Is that not, in the Prime Minister's own words, truly a "dishonest and absurd" promise?

The Prime Minister: If the tax burden is so high, why does the right hon. Gentleman propose to increase it still further? When it was pointed out to the right hon. and learned Member for Monklands, East (Mr. Smith) that his taxes would rise, the right hon. and learned Gentleman seemed surprised: what the right hon. and learned Gentleman said, in effect, was that taxes under Labour


would "only" rise higher than those in any other G7 country—lower, perhaps, than taxes in Albania, but higher than those of all our competitors.

Mr. Kinnock: Will the Prime Minister, in the last couple of weeks left to him in that office, try answering the question? Does he not recall that he has promised to increase public expenditure, to cut taxes and to balance the budget? His promises do not add up. He was right—[Interruption.]

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Mr. Kinnock: The Prime Minister has made all those promises. He was right: those promises are dishonest—[Interruption.] I am quoting the Prime Minister, and he will hear this again—[interruption.]

Mr. Speaker: Order. Let us have an end to this pointing across the Chamber.

Mr. Kinnock: Even deliberate disruption will not stop the country hearing this. The Prime Minister has described promises to cut taxes and raise public expenditure as "dishonest and absurd". He was at least right about that —and right about the Government who are making such promises.

The Prime Minister: In the 1980s we did cut taxation and raise public expenditure. The right hon. Gentleman makes an absurd point. Under the Labour Government, borrowing averaged more than 6 per cent. of national product; since 1979, it has averaged not 6 per cent. but less than 2 per cent. Before the right hon. Gentleman starts to give lectures on borrowing, he should get his facts right. In one year under Labour, borrowing reached a crippling 9½ per cent.—the equivalent of £55 billion today. That was the Labour party's half decade of debt and now they plan another £37 billion worth of expenditure. Which would it be: £37 billion of extra taxes or £37 billion of extra expenditure?

Mr. Hill: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 27 February.

The Prime Minister: I refer my hon. Friend to the reply that I gave some moments ago.

Mr. Hill: On the eve of the first anniversary of the Gulf war, will my right hon. Friend join me in expressing our gratitude to our armed forces, our commitment to the independence of Kuwait and our determination to ensure that Saddam Hussein and his generals comply with all international sanctions or suffer the consequences?

The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is quite right. The whole country is proud of the role that our armed forces played in the liberation of Kuwait. The way in which Saddam Hussein still behaves is unacceptable to us, to the United Nations and to the international community, and we shall continue to keep pressure on him.

Mr. Ashley: Is the Prime Minister aware that something far more valuable than the woolly citizens charter was brought before this House recently—a Bill to improve the rights of disabled people—but was talked out by Conservative Members? Will he now undertake to rescue the Bill? Or is this yet another example of the Government and their supporters talking up human rights in theory and knocking them down in practice?

The Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman has done a great deal during his period in the House for disabled people and everyone in the House admires him for what he has done, but he must know that there have been dramatic improvements in recent years in the scope, range and value of benefits and in the number of disabled people who receive them. No doubt there is still more to do, and it will be done in due course, but the right hon. Gentleman ought not to deny what has been done.

Mr. Bellingham: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 27 February.

The Prime Minister: I refer my hon. Friend to the reply that I gave some moments ago.

Mr. Bellingham: Does the Prime Minister recognise that, because of privatisation, the water companies are spending £28 billion on improving water quality, including schemes in west Norfolk to upgrade drinking water and clean up our beaches? Is he aware that renationalising water would cost the taxpayer £8 billion and that the whole of this investment programme would be put at risk? Is that really what the Labour party wants?

The Prime Minister: I suspect that it is. My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. Yesterday, Labour's spokesman made the point that nationalising water was a priority—yet another priority—which would cost £8 billion. There was no sign of where the money will come from, and no sign of any advantage from the policy just sheer blind dogma.

Mr. Ashdown: With British industry burdened by record debt and Britain's trade deficit at its highest for a year, will the Prime Minister explain why tax cuts which will suck in more imports are right while public investment in the kind of things that Britain needs for the future is wrong?

The Prime Minister: There was a time in the history of the Liberal party when it trusted people with their own money and believed that they could make their own decisions. I note that, yet again, the Liberal party is aligning itself with the Labour party on social and taxation matters. The whole country will note that, too.

Mr. Kilfedder: I am sure that the Prime Minister will join me in expressing the utmost admiration for the Australian people and the great commonwealth of Australia. Will he therefore do his best to defuse the present unhappy situation and assure the people of that great continent that, although they may be on the other side of the world, they are close to the hearts of the people of the United Kingdom?

The Prime Minister: I will certainly undertake to do that. I agree entirely with my hon. Friend on that matter.

Wallsend

Mr. Ted Garrett: To ask the Prime Minister if he will visit Wallsend.

The Prime Minister: I am making plans for a series of visits to all parts of the country and hope to return to the north-east in the midst of those plans.

Mr. Garrett: I would like the Prime Minister to visit Wallsend because he visited the neighbouring


Conservative-held constituency and saw the destruction arising from the Meadowell riots as a result of 13 years of Thatcherism. The Prime Minister would be most welcome to visit the Wallsend part of North Tyneside where he would have an opportunity to visit Swan Hunter and see a dedicated work force, a dedicated management and, above all, the pride of the people in Wallsend in building and refitting ships for the Royal Navy. He would also learn about a series of problems, the main one of which is the unfair subsidies to ship building companies in the European Community which are handicapping the British ship building industry in terms of merchant shipping orders.

The Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman makes a fair point and I have considerable sympathy with what he says about that. The Government's plans for the future naval fleet, including those recently announced for amphibious forces, will provide excellent opportunities for Swan Hunter to bid to obtain more orders. On the subject of equitability across Europe, our aim is to establish that and competitive conditions for all United Kingdom ship builders as soon as possible at national and international levels. We shall certainly keep up the pressure to achieve that, in the interests of Swan Hunter and many other fine firms in the United Kingdom.

Mr. Nicholas Winterton: On his way to Wallsend, will my right hon. Friend visit the north-west of the United Kingdom, and the borough of Macclesfield in particular?

If he does, he will find an area ready to respond to the sound foundations of the economy that he and the Government have established.

The Prime Minister: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his very warm support. I had the opportunity to visit the north-west on Monday, where I found a good deal of buoyancy and confidence in the future of the north-west and of the country as a whole.

Engagements

Mr. Skinner: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 27 February.

The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply that I gave some moments ago.

Mr. Skinner: Does the Prime Minister not have a guilty conscience about his role as an ex-social security Minister? Does he remember the period after 1985 when he came to the Dispatch Box and abolished the death grant and took away maternity grant and income support for 16 and 17-year-olds, while all the time pensioners were losing £14 a week? What is all this claptrap about a classless society and a citizens charter? The pensioners need more than that —and not that load of hypocrisy from the Prime Minister.

The Prime Minister: If the hon. Gentleman wants to know about claptrap, he should listen to what he has just said. If he examines the record, he will see that for people in need I dramatically increased the amounts available for the death grant.

Business of the House

Dr. John Cunningham: Will the Leader of the House please give us the business for next week?

The Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. John MacGregor): The business for next week will be as follows:
MONDAY 2 MARCH—Until seven o'clock, motion to take note of EC documents relating to asylum and immigration. Details will be given in the Official Report.
Debate on the report from the Select Committee on Sittings of the House on a motion for the Adjournment of the House.
Motion on the Church of England (Miscellaneous Provisions) Measure.
TUESDAY 3 MARCH—Remaining stages of the Further and Higher Education Bill [Lords].
Proceedings on the Taxation of Chargeable Gains Bill [Lords], which is a consolidation measure.
Motion on the Appropriation (Northern Ireland) Order.
WEDNESDAY 4 MARCH—Supplemental timetable motion on and consideration of Lords amendments to the Local Government Finance Bill.
Completion of remaining stages of the Transport and Works Bill.
Remaining stages of the Offshore Safety Bill [Lords] and the Nurses, Midwives and Health Visitors Bill [Lords].
Motion on the Social Security (Disability Living Allowance) (Amendment) Regulations.
THURSDAY 5 MARCH—Estimates day (2nd Allotted Day, 1st Part). There will be a debate on Yugoslavia. Details of the estimate concerned and the relevant Select Committee Report will be given in the Official Report.
Debate on Northern Ireland affairs on a motion for the Adjournment of the House.
At ten o'clock the Question will be put on all outstanding supplementary estimates and votes.
FRIDAY 6 MARCH—Private Members' motions.
MONDAY 9 MARCH—Second Reading of the Friendly Societies Bill.
Debate on the report of the Accommodation and Works Committee in respect of phase 2 parliamentary building.
The Chairman of Ways and Means is expected to name opposed private business for consideration at seven o'clock.
The House will also wish to know that European Standing Committee 'A' will meet at 10.30 am on Wednesday 4 March to consider European Community document No. 8910/91, relating to common organisation of the market in the sugar and isoglucose sector.

[Monday 2 March, Floor of the House

Revant European Community Documents

(a) 8810/91 Right of Asylum

(b) 8811/91 Immigration

Relevant Reports of European Legislation Committee

(a) HC 24-x (1991–92)

(b) HC 24-x (1991–92)

Wednesday 4 March, European Standing Committee A Relevant European Community Document

8910/91 Sugar and Isoglucose Sector (Court of Auditors Special Report No 4/91)

Relevant Report of the European Legislation Committee HC 24-vii (1991–92)

Thursday 5 March, Estimates Day (2nd Allotted Day, 1st Part), class II, vote 2, Foreign and Commonwealth Office: other external relations, in so far as it relates to Yugoslavia.

Relevant report: First report from the Foreign Affairs Committee, Session 1991–92 (HC 21): "Central and Eastern Europe: Problems of the Post-Communist Era"].

Dr. Cunningham: On the business for Monday—the sittings and conduct of business in the House—will the Leader of the House take time to explain why he has apparently advised the Commissioner of Customs and Excise not to answer questions when giving evidence before the Select Committee on Trade and Industry in the inquiry into the supergun affair? Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will confirm whether that is indeed the case, as that gentleman said. What has the Customs and Excise to hide in that inquiry? Is it not rather odd for the Leader of the House himself apparently to be undermining the work of Select Committees of the House? May we have an explanation of those events, please?
May we express disappointment that the Leader of the House has not provided either a Government Supply day next week or an Opposition Supply day to debate Britain's abysmal trade performance? He must surely be aware of the appalling deficit of almost £800 million in January, with Britain's trade in the depths of the longest recession for more than 50 years. Does that not demonstrate beyond doubt the depths to which the Government's economic mismanagement has brought the British economy? Should we not have an opportunity to debate that next week?
I thank the Leader of the House for acceding to our requests to have next week's guillotined debate at a more appropriate time—on Wednesday in prime time—than the time that he originally intended? Will he ensure that the Secretary of State for the Environment, his right hon. Friend the Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine), comes to the House, and that when he talks about what he described as the "Tory tax"—the poll tax—he explains why this year average poll tax bills will be about £50 more than the Secretary of State for the Environment suggested that they would be—and why people are still paying an extra 2·5 per cent. VAT on their expenditure subject to that tax? May we have an explanation of those matters from the Secretary of State for the Environment next week?
Last week I asked the Leader of the House to give us a guarantee that the House would have the normal time to debate the Budget when it is introduced on 10 March. Will he assure us that the Budget debate will not be cut short and guillotined because of the Government's 9 April general election programme? May we have that assurance —yes or no?

Mr. MacGregor: I am happy to deal with the first point now, because the hon. Gentleman has got it all wrong. It would have been very helpful if the hon. Gentleman had checked his facts. I must say that I am very dubious about many of his charges, given how wrong he is on that one.


The Customs and Excise official asked my office for guidance as to what the Government's response was to the Select Committee on Procedure recommendations in relation to prosecution authorities' answers in front of Select Committees. My office referred him to an official who gave him the information, which is publicly available, about the Government's response to the Procedure Committee's remarks. That is all that happened. The hon. Gentleman made an absolute meal out of it and got it totally and completely wrong. It makes one wonder about the other charges that he makes.
As for the point about the trade figures, of course it will be possible to discuss the economic situation, yet again, soon. We shall be happy to do so. The hon. Gentleman will know that the figures for the past three months show that the balance of payments deficit is broadly in line with the quarterly average for last year, and that the underlying trade performance is good and improving. Export volumes in the past three months were up 3·5 per cent. on a year earlier, despite the slowdown in world trade. Manufactured export volumes are also up by 3·5 per cent. over that period and exports to the European Community are 4 per cent. higher. On the same basis, total imports are up just 1 per cent. So we would be happy to debate that matter.
As for the hon. Gentleman's third request, as he knows, I always try to arrange business as much as possible in ways that are suitable to both sides of the House. He made a point about the community charge. Once again, the Opposition are peddling figures which have no basis in fact. The real figures for community charge increases this year will include an element for those who did not pay their community charge. And who encouraged many people not to pay? It was Opposition Members and many Labour councillors around the country.
On the hon. Gentleman's final point, Mr. Speaker, you urged me and others to concentrate on the business for next week. As the hon. Gentleman knows, his final point was not about next week's business. But I shall be happy to deal with it in next week's business statement.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

Mr. Speaker: I refer again to what the Leader of the House just said. Let us deal with next week's business, please.

Sir David Mitchell: Will my right hon. Friend find time next week for a debate or, failing that, a statement on the problem of itinerants, new age travellers and gipsies? Can we have some action?

Mr. MacGregor: I am aware of my hon. Friend's concern and that of many of my hon. Friends about that matter, and I share it. I know that my hon. Friend took the opportunity of raising the matter in the House on 12 December on the Adjournment. I am also aware that he recently met my hon. Friend the Minister for Housing and Planning to consider the matter. The Government are certainly aware that there are difficulties with the operation of the provisions of the Caravan Sites Act 1968. A review is under consideration. I assure my hon. Friend that that work is proceeding with all due pace. However, I am not sure whether we shall be able to make a statement next week.

Mr. James Wallace: As a former Fisheries Minister, the Leader of the House will

know that for some time many of us have pressed the case for a decommissioning scheme to be introduced by the Government. Can he confirm reports that an announcement to that effect is imminent? Will the relevant Minister come to the House next week to make that statement?
Could the Leader of the House also secure the attendance of a Minister to respond to early-day motion 129?
[That this House recalls the special arrangements made by the Government to increase benefits to pre-1973 war widows; notes that beneficiaries of the armed forces pension scheme who were invalided from the service prior to 1973 do not benefit from the improvement made to that scheme introduced in 1973 in the same way that pre-1973 war widows did not benefit until recently; and therefore calls upon the Government to take immediate action to remedy this situation and upgrade armed forces pensions payments to those former servicemen who left the services prior to 1973, particularly those who were invalided from the services and suffered disability in the service of their country.]
The motion calls for equality of treatment in terms of pension for those invalided out of the armed services before and after 1973. In recent months the Government have shown common sense in relation to compensation for haemophiliacs who contracted HIV. Previously they did so for war widows widowed before and after 1973, allowing proper treatment for them. Surely those who suffered disability in the service of their country deserve equal treatment too.

Mr. MacGregor: On the second point, as the hon. Gentleman rightly recognised, the Government introduced special payments for pre-1973 war widows in recognition of the view widely held in Parliament and in Britain at large that they were a unique group for whom exceptional treatment was appropriate. The position on pre-1973 war disability pensioners is somewhat different, and it is not considered that similar special action is justified.
On the first point, as the hon. Gentleman probably knows, the Government are considering the conservation issues which are raised as a result of various discussions in the European Community. I am not yet in a position to say when conclusions will be reached. When they are reached, I shall certainly consider how that might be made known to the House.

Rev. Ian Paisley: May I thank the Leader of the House for receiving my colleagues the leader of the Social Democratic and Labour party, the hon. Member for Foyle (Mr. Hume), and the leader of the Ulster Unionists, the right hon. Member for Lagan Valley (Mr. Molyneaux), and for listening carefully to the representations made to him that there should be a debate in the House on the affairs of Northern Ireland following the Downing street meeting that we had with the Prime Minister? May I thank him on behalf of the people of Northern Ireland for giving time on Thursday for that important debate?

Mr. MacGregor: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman and to hon. Members opposite for raising that matter with me. It is an important debate. He is right to say that it follows the Downing street talks with my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister. I am pleased that further initiatives have followed those talks. I considered it right to respond immediately to their request for a debate. I wish that I


could have given longer, but there is a lot of pressure on the House next week. I thought it right to respond to that request for an immediate debate, and I am glad to have been able to do so.

Mr. John Hume: I join the hon. Member for Antrim, North (Rev. Ian Paisley) in expressing our appreciation to the Leader of the House for the speed with which he responded to the joint request by the three leaders in Northern Ireland, as that will be the first time in the life of this Parliament that a major debate on the situation in Northern Ireland will take place. May I express the hope that all parties will show their concern for the fact that that is the major human problem facing this Parliament by being present and taking part in the debate?

Mr. MacGregor: I thank the hon. Gentleman. As he knows, we give a great deal of time to Northern Ireland issues in the House, and have done so in recent weeks, but this debate is rather different and very special. It follows the initiatives that have been taken recently in the light of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister's discussions at Downing street with the hon. Gentleman and others. It is an important debate and I am sure that as many people as possible will wish to be here. However, the hon. Gentleman will recognise that the debate will be at a time when many hon. Members will expect to be back in their constituencies. However, I agree with him and I am glad that we have been able to find time for that important and wide-ranging debate.

Mr. Bob Dunn: Would the Leader of the House consider an urgent request from me to try to rearrange business next week to give us the chance to debate education philosophy, given that the Opposition wish to pass a sentence of death on the grammar school, the high school and the city technology college in my constituency? If they had their way, we would end up with an education philosophy which would give only the rich a choice in education.

Mr. MacGregor: I agree entirely. I should have liked to find time next week, and I hope that we shall find time not long afterwards. My hon. Friend is right to say that that is the Opposition's single distinctive contribution on education. I cannot think of anything more deleterious to increasing opportunities, the range of choice, and so on. They would abolish all the opportunities for greater variety and improvement of standards which have been introduced through city technology colleges, the assisted places scheme and grant-maintained schools, and they would abolish existing grammar schools. My hon. Friend is right that that means that opportunities for people from lower income households to take advantage of that range of choice would disappear.

Mr. James Lamond: Will the Leader of the House find out whether the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry noticed the statement last week by Alan Nightingale, chairman of the Apparel, Knitting and Textile Alliance, drawing attention to a large number of methods that other countries are using either to prevent our textiles getting into their countries or to aid theirs getting into our country? Will he also find out whether the Secretary of State would like to

make a statement about that to try to save some of the many thousands of jobs which are in danger? He might even let us know what is happening with the GATT talks.

Mr. MacGregor: As the House knows, the Government are keen to see a conclusion to the GATT talks for reasons that we have often debated. So far as the textile industry is concerned in that respect, for the time being, as the hon. Gentleman knows, pending a final outcome of the GATT negotiations the existing multi-fibre arrangement has been rolled on for another year. I shall raise his first point with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry.

Mr. Anthony Coombs: Will my right hon. Friend provide an opportunity next week for us to talk about welcome recent Government action on youth crime, especially the measures dealing with joy riding and with bail offenders, and other matters? Will he give the House an opportunity to consider the recent case in which, as a result of the Children and Young Persons Act 1969, a judge in Birmingham was unable to give more than a one-year sentence to a 15-year-old boy who killed a 24-year-old woman? The judge said that that had resulted in an injustice.

Mr. MacGregor: As my hon. Friend correctly says, in addition to the many measures of previous years, the Government have introduced further measures in the current Session of Parliament to deal with issues relating to crime—such as the measure dealing with offences committed while on bail, and the Aggravated Vehicles Taking Bill. We shall continue to do that despite the fact that the Opposition often turn out to be soft on crime. I can assure my hon. Friend that we shall continue to ensure that proper protection is given to our citizens.

Mr. Harry Barnes: Before next Thursday, may we have some highly secret information published as to how many people are on electoral registers in England and Wales? The registers have been published for Northern Ireland, and provisional figures have been given for Scotland, but we do not have the figures for England and Wales. We need to have them if we are to decide whether an urgent debate is required on the position that they reveal.

Mr. MacGregor: The hon. Gentleman has raised that matter on many previous occasions and I have made clear the exact position. I understand that the hon. Gentleman is so concerned because he feels that his own position will be at risk in the forthcoming general election. On the information requested, the electoral registers will be published in good time.

Sir Dudley Smith: In view of the extraordinary revelations published in The Sunday Times about the long-held beliefs of the Leader of the Opposition, does my right hon. Friend believe that it would be helpful to the electorate to have a debate on the role of the Leader of the Opposition and his fitness for office, bearing in mind that leopards who protest that they have changed their spots are almost always kidding?

Mr. MacGregor: My hon. Friend has made his point. I cannot promise a debate next week, but some of the complete reversals of principle and policy undertaken by the Leader of the Opposition in recent years will be the subject of much discussion in the period ahead.

Mr. Dafydd Wigley: The Leader of the House will be aware of the expectation that an order would come before the House to allow the Welsh Grand Committee to meet in Cardiff to debate the constitutional future of Wales—an issue which is particularly relevant in view of this week's opinion poll showing a 2:1 majority in favour of an elected parliament for Wales. What has happened to the order? Will it be debated next week? The Secretary of State for Wales suggested that the Welsh Grand Committee would meet in Cardiff. Is that likely, or is someone holding it up?

Mr. MacGregor: My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Wales said that he would be happy for a meeting of the Welsh Grand Committee to discuss those matters, and that included its meeting in Wales. That requires a debatable Standing Order and the pressures on business next week are great.

Mr. Andrew McKay: Is my right hon. Friend aware that there is some disappointment on the Conservative Back Benches that the debate next Monday on the sittings of the House report will be taken on the Adjournment? That will mean that many hon. Members, who believe that the intention of that report is about giving Back Benchers more time, will not be able to vote on an amendment. Such an amendment would be directed at the Leader of the Opposition, who uses 40 words when four will do and abuses Prime Minister's Question Time twice a week, which keeps us out.

Mr. MacGregor: The latter point is not a matter for me. On my hon. Friend's first point, he will know that the report of the Committee on working hours, under the chairmanship of my right hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Mr. Jopling), covered a wide range of ground and went much further than the simple point raised by my hon. Friend about giving more time to Back Benchers. It is also concerned with other issues as to how we handle the business of the House. It seems to me that the report contains so many recommendations that the House will wish to consider very seriously that it is not possible in the time frame of next week to have a debate on substantive proposals. In view of the wide interest in the report, it is right to have a general debate to establish the general reaction to it as quickly as possible. That is why I arranged the debate for next Monday.

Mr. Gerald Bermingham: When the Leader of the House takes time off from considering D-day—declaration of poll day—will he arrange a debate next week, if not sooner, or have a statement made so that we may learn why the Home Secretary and his Ministers of State are increasingly interfering in the decisions of the parole board, such interference having risen from 3 to 30 per cent. in the past five years?

Mr. MacGregor: Not next week.

Sir Anthony Durant: Will my right hon. Friend consider having a debate next week on the subject of personal savings so that we may know the attitude of the Labour party to the taxation of those savings?

Mr. MacGregor: I think we know that there are proposals from the Labour party effectively to increase

taxation on a large number of savings. I welcome the opportunitty to highlight that as much as possible, and I hope that we shall have that opportunity before long.

Mr. Thomas Graham: Is it normal practice for a Minister to send a reply to a parliamentary question to a prospective parliamentary candidate? I ask that question because an article appeared in my local paper stating——

Mr. Speaker: Order. That seems rather wide of the business for next week.

Mr. Graham: Will the right hon. Gentleman arrange for a statement to be made next week about an article in my local newspaper stating that the answer to a parliamentary question of mine had been sent to the local prospective Tory candidate? The article stated that the candidate had said that she had seen the reply. Is it normal practice for parliamentary answers to be sent to candidates?

Mr. MacGregor: I do not know the local paper to which the hon. Gentleman refers, and I do not know of the report, so I have to say that I know nothing about the issue.

Mr. Richard Page: With the callous plundering of pension funds by that heartless monster Robert Maxwell, may I ask if my right hon. Friend is aware that my constituents who are today in receipt of pensions have been told that their pensions can be guaranteed only until the end of March and that beyond that date payment is in doubt? With two thirds of the pension fund stolen, and with doubt as to which part of the pension fund moneys belong to which pensions, may I urge my right hon. Friend to arrange for a debate to take place next week, or for a statement to be made, so that we may discuss the matter? My constituents are worried sick. In particular, we should be told whether the new section 58B in schedule 4(2) to the Social Security Act 1990 will be invoked.

Mr. MacGregor: I cannot immediately recall section 58B of that measure. I do not carry in my head the detail of every clause of every piece of legislation, but if it is the section which deals with guaranteed minimum payments in the event of pension funds not being able to pay——

Mr. David Shaw: It deals with creditors' preference.

Mr. MacGregor: That relates to the eventual situation regarding the protection of pensioners. As for the issues relating to the Maxwell pension funds, my hon. Friend will know that a number of investigations are going on now. I fully understand his concern for the pensioners. We shall have to await the outcome of the investigations before considering what action, if any, is required. The basic minimum pension arrangements are already in place.

Mr. Alex Salmond: Will the Leader of the House reconsider his decision not to allocate a half Supply day to the Scottish National party, despite the clear request of the right hon. Member for Lagan Valley (Mr. Molyneaux) on behalf of all minority parties? Is he aware that that would have been the ideal opportunity to discuss Scottish matters, particularly the Government's apparent change of heart on the decommissioning scheme which, despite the obvious cynicism involved, will be widely welcomed by hon. Members who represent fishing


communities? What does the right hon. Gentleman think will be the reaction at the quayside in Scotland for a Government who have kicked that vital industry from pillar to post for the past six years and now, six weeks before a general election, decide to change course?

Mr. MacGregor: I disagree absolutely with the hon. Gentleman's remarks about the Government's position in respect of the fishing industry. As he knows, the main problem facing the European Community and fishing Ministers has been the decline in stocks and the consequent need for conservation. Unless that is tackled, there will be an even more difficult future for our fishermen. It is right for the Government and the Council of Ministers to concentrate on that aspect. As someone who has been involved in that question over the past six years, I assure the hon. Gentleman that enormous efforts are made to ensure that the fishing industry gets the best possible deal in the negotiations, and the Government have frequently been given credit for making them.
As to the hon. Gentleman's demand for a Supply day, I am—as I said earlier—bearing that request in mind, but it is obvious from next week's programme that the House has a great deal of business to complete. I have been giving Supply days fairly regularly, and I thought it right to respond to the request by leaders of Northern Ireland parties to provide time to debate Northern Ireland next week.

Mr. John Wilkinson: I urge my right hon. Friend to reconsider his decision, which he explained in reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Berkshire, East (Mr. MacKay), concerning Monday evening's Adjournment debate on the report of the Select Committee on Sittings of the House. Is it not the case that the House has an incomparable opportunity before Parliament is dissolved to benefit from the wide advice of many senior right hon. and hon. Members who are about to retire and who, looking back over decades of experience, know how our proceedings could be improved? If we do not take that opportunity, is there not a risk that the Committee's admirable report is likely to gather dust, and that nothing will be done to improve our procedures?

Mr. MacGregor: No, I certainly hope that that will not be the case. I established the Committee because I was anxious to make progress. The right hon. and hon. Members to whom my hon. Friend referred, who have given many years' service in the House but will not be standing for Parliament again, were able to put their points to the Select Committee—to which I pay tribute again as it completed an enormous amount of work in a short time. Monday evening's debate will provide an opportunity for right hon. and hon. Members to express views not only about the report's general tenor but about its specific recommendations.

Mr. Huw Edwards: Will the Leader of the House arrange a debate next week on the increasing tendency among health authorities to impose charges in national health service hospitals? Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that Nevill Hall hospital, Monmouth, proposes to introduce car parking charges for its staff, out-patients, those visiting the sick, and hospital

volunteers? Will the House have an opportunity to debate a practice which my constituents consider to be a gross violation of the principle of a free health service, and one that is indicative of the managerialism that is ripping the soul out of the NHS? The public could then decide whether they want a Government who believe increasingly in charging the sick, those who visit them, and those who care for them.

Mr. MacGregor: Those matters have been much discussed in the House and outside, and many of the scare stories have been disposed of. The hon. Gentleman speaks of "managerialism" as though it were something to be deprecated. I am sure that he understands that more effective use of the ever-rising NHS expenditure in directing it at patient care benefits patients themselves. It is indicative of Labour that it dismisses that aspect so easily, and explains why Labour is unable to present proposals for reforms that will ensure better use of ever-increasing resources of the kind that the Government have implemented.

Mr. David Sumberg: May we debate sport next week? As my right hon. Friend knows from his successful visit yesterday to my constituency, Manchester's Olympic bid is very much at the heart of the regional issue. Such a debate would give me an opportunity to record how pleased we are that the Government will back that bid, and how good that will be for the region's development.

Mr. MacGregor: I very much enjoyed my visit to my hon. Friend's constituency yesterday—and, indeed, my visit to Manchester as a whole. Before I left, the responses that I was getting told me that yesterday's announcement by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister would be widely welcomed.

Mr. Bob Cryer: May we have a debate next week on animal welfare? Does the Leader of the House accept that stuffing 650 letters into hon. Members' postboxes is no substitute for a debate and a statement from the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food? In the first place, such action constitutes an abuse of the House.
If we had a debate, the Minister could explain why he sent around a limp letter full of excuses about animal welfare, but voted against the Wild Mammals (Protection) Bill—along with 12 other Cabinet Ministers—in order to dish the legislation and protect fox hunters, allowing them to go around loosing their bloodlust on defenceless animals. It is time we had a debate to expose the hypocrisy of those Ministers and the Government.

Mr. MacGregor: As the hon. Gentleman knows, the fox-hunting issue is not as he puts it. I hope that he will consider what foxes do to other animals. As for animal welfare, I would welcome a debate on that whenever it can be fitted in, because I believe that the Government's record on animal welfare issues is very strong. We have placed great emphasis on such issues, and we have led in the European Community in that regard. My right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food has played a notable part in the process.

Mr. David Shaw: Can my right hon. Friend confirm that a most important Adjournment debate on the shipping industry is to take place next Thursday? It will


make particular reference to Dover's ferry industry, much of whose case may be put during it. The debate is extremely timely—five days before the Budget. Can my right hon. Friend confirm that a Treasury Minister will be present, as well as a Transport Minister?

Mr. MacGregor: I cannot confirm which Minister will be dealing with that Adjournment debate, but I can certainly confirm that such a debate will take place on the important issue to which my hon. Friend has referred. I am well aware of the active interest that he takes in the issue: it is, in fact, his own Adjournment debate.

Mr. Archy Kirkwood: Is the Leader of the House aware that the south-east of Scotland is alive with rumours that the Government will be making a statement about the A1 between Edinburgh and Newcastle? Can he confirm that such a statement will be made at the Dispatch Box, rather than an announcement being made in a clandestine, underhand way? May we have statements from both the Secretary of State for Transport, on the English side, and the Secretary of State for Scotland, on the Scottish side—on the same day?

Mr. MacGregor: I shalll have to consider both the timing and whether a statement would be appropriate; I shall also have to consider whether two Ministers should deal with the matter. I will look into it.

Mr. John Carlisle: Will my right hon. Friend consider arranging a debate next week about the security of hon. Members' offices, both here and in their constituencies? He may be aware that my office was broken into earlier this week, and that valuable computer evidence was stolen. Does he agree that such a debate is necessary to nail the lie that has been put about—primarily by Labour Members and, in particular, by the hon. Member for Neath (Mr. Hain)—that a Conservative dirty tricks brigade was responsible? That would be understandable in my case, but it might not be in the case of other hon. Members.

Mr. MacGregor: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising the matter. He has enabled me to say that I do not see any need for such a debate because the allegations made by some Opposition Members are totally without foundation.

Mr. Peter Hain: Will the Leader of the House find time next week to debate the future of the 999 service? It has emerged in the past few hours that British Telecom plans to hive off the service to an independent agency. That will have a massive impact on the quality of service —[HON. MEMBERS: "Why?"] I will explain why. Such a move will pose a massive threat to the quality of service. At present, the 999 service rides on the back of the general operator service. People can drop their general operator work and respond immediately. The proposal also involves shutting down many telephone operator centres, as a result of which those operating the 999 service will have no local knowledge.
This constitutes a severe threat to people's lives and security. Dogma is involved here. The aim is to ensure that British Telecom satisfies the City's objective by cutting its staff in post figures, rather than protecting the public. The Government should make a statement about the matter next week.

Mr. MacGregor: I think that the hon. Gentleman has made a speech about the matter. I had hoped that he would say something about the allegations that he made about the computer issue. As I have said, those allegations are without foundation. I shall now reply to what the hon. Gentleman has just said. I know nothing of this report. I shall have to look into it.

Mr. David Tredinnick: Will my right hon. Friend find time next week to debate the chaotic traffic position on one of Britain's arterial roads, the A5, which runs past my constituency? Is he aware that there have been serious accidents on that road? The fact that it has not been improved between Hinckley and Nuneaton means that jobs are being lost in the area, because land by the A5 in Hinckley cannot be developed. Will he deal with this matter with some urgency, please?

Mr. MacGregor: I will take up the point with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport. However, I am sure that my hon. Friend will acknowledge that there has been a substantial increase in the road-building programme all over the country.

Mr. David Trimble: Although we welcome next Thursday's debate, can the Leader of the House assure us that the Prime Minister will take part in the debate so that, following his speech in Scotland last week, he can demonstrate an equal concern for the union with Northern Ireland and also show how we can have a form of decentralisation that is common throughout the United Kingdom? Secondly, on Tuesday's appropriation debate—

Mr. Speaker: Order. In business questions, can we have one question only, please?

Mr. Trimble: Then I shall save the second one for later.

Mr. MacGregor: I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will not think that simply because one of my right hon. Friends does not participate in a debate it means that he is not intensely interested in the question. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has made speeches on the Scottish devolution issue but does not take part in Scottish Grand Committee debates on the subject. I think that it is unlikely that my right hon. Friend will take part in the debate next week, but I have already discussed it with him, following the request that I had from the leaders of the three parties in Northern Ireland. I discussed it with my right hon. Friend before deciding on the business for next week, and I can tell the hon. Gentleman that my right hon. Friend was extremely keen to have that debate. As I say, it follows from the inititive that he took in Downing street.

Mr. Harry Greenway: Will my right hon. Friend arrange a debate on post offices for next week? It would enable me to say how well post offices operate throughout the borough of Ealing, generally speaking, and to draw attention to the proposed closure of the Church road post office, Northolt, which would be extremely serious and inconvenient for pensioners and for mothers with young children, among others. The House needs to discuss this very important issue. That post office should be saved.

Mr. MacGregor: My hon. Friend is extremely assiduous in bringing the concerns of his constituents to the attention of the House. I am sure that he will find ways of doing so himself.

Mr. Dennis Skinner: May we have a statement on the £55 million that the Government have offered to Manchester in respect of its bid to hold the Olympic games there in the year 2000? That debate would have to take into account the fact that when Manchester made its previous bid the present Prime Minister, who has now agreed to that money, was Chancellor of the Exchequer and earlier Chief Secretary to the Treasury. He was the man holding the purse strings then, and he refused to give Manchester a single penny piece. Now he stands on the doorstep of No. 10 gloating about it. Are not the Tory Government guilty of a bribe a day to keep the voters at bay?

Mr. MacGregor: It is typically churlish of the hon. Gentleman to take that position in relation to the Government's decision to give very substantial support to Manchester's bid.

Mr. Jacques Arnold: Could we have a debate next week on NHS fund-holding practices? My right hon. Friend may not be aware that the Marshlands practice at Higham in my constituency has been a fund-holding practice since last April. Since then it has vastly increased the treatment that is given locally, not least by bringing in consultants, it has cut its waiting lists and it is giving better value for money. Does my right hon. Friend not think it important that during such a debate we could highlight the fact that the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) is so impressed by such an effective piece of NHS reform that he wants to scrap it and put that practice under the remote NHS bureaucracy?

Mr. MacGregor: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I want to find every opportunity to highlight the benefits that general practitioner fund holding is bringing to GPs and their patients. My hon. Friend has done that well today. I am sure that his constituents will observe the benefits that are being brought to them—benefits that the Labour party would wish to take away.

Mr. Alun Michael: Will the Leader of the House agree to a debate next week on early-day motion 715, tabled on an all-party basis, dealing with the pursuit of peace in Somalia?
[That this House welcomes the news that, under the auspices of the United Nations, an agreement has been signed between leaders of the two warring factions in Southern Somalia; is concerned that fighting appears to be continuing and calls on the British Government and the international community to redouble efforts to achieve a lasting peace in Somalia; draws attention to the fact that the parties who are involved in the fighting in the south have no claim, separately or together, to represent the people of Northern Somalia; calls on the international community to recognise that the people of the North have expressed a wish for independence as the Republic of Somaliland; notes that there are very close links between the North and the Somali communities in Britain; notes also that the North suffered for years in a hidden war under the regime of ex-president Barre during which time families, relatives and friends of British Somalis were killed or fled the country; notes that there has been relative stability in the north for the past year

under a de facto government which includes the Somalia National Movement and other northern groups; and calls on the British Government and the international community to do all they can to ensure that the representatives of the North are involved in peaceful discussions aimed at achieving a peaceful and long-term settlement by agreement, including settlement of the request for recognition by the Republic of Somaliland in the North.]
Will the Leader of the House accept that this is given special and increased urgency because of a letter that I received today from the Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations, Mr. James Jonah, in which he refers to recent consultations in New York with what he describes as
the two Somali factions—Interim President Ali Mandi Mohammed and General Mohammed Farah Aideed.
That omits the interim Government of the north, who wish independence as the Republic of Somaliland. The north is the area with which the Somalis in Britain have contact and where they have many relatives and friends who have suffered through the hidden war over the past 10 years that has left many dead and many refugees.
Does the Leader of the House agree that we should debate this matter and ensure that the House, the international community and the United Nations bring all parties to the table to try to achieve peace? Does he agree that that would be better than the danger of the south being led by one faction and the north being left out of the peace deliberations? I am sure that the Leader of the House and the Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, will agree with the facts as I have described them. Can we have an opportunity to raise the issue publicly?

Mr. MacGregor: I do not see an opportunity for such a debate in Government time next week. It could be undertaken in ways that are available to hon. Members to raise topics. I am not aware of the letter to which the hon. Gentleman referred, but I have seen the early-day motion. As he knows, the Government welcome the United Nations initiative on Somalia. I understand that a conference is to be held in Mogadishu later this month to which all factions will be invited.

Mr. John Marshall: May I join those who have asked my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House to arrange an early debate on the national health service? Is my right hon. Friend aware that a recent visitor to the Manor House hospital in my constituency described it as a unique hospital with a very high quality of care for patients, many of whom are members of the TUC?
Is not it a double standard to say that private health care is good for members of the Trades Union Congress and bad for the rest of us? Is my right hon. Friend aware that the visitor who displayed those double standards was none other than Mrs. Glenys Kinnock?

Mr. MacGregor: I agree with my hon. Friend that that shows the Labour party's hypocrisy on this issue. It devotes so much energy to condemning those who pay for their hospital treatment through hospital subscriptions, thus adding to the resources of the health service, as do many at the hospital to which my hon. Friend referred. Such people also help hospitals to raise substantial sums, a process which the Labour party also criticises. I


understand that Mrs. Kinnock was praising that fund raising at the hospital last week. It seems that there is one law for TUC members and another for everyone else.

Mr. Win Griffiths: Many people will be disappointed that the Leader of the House did not announce a debate next week on the future of Kuwait, bearing in mind the fact that tomorrow is the anniversary of its liberation. The Leader of the House will know that many people from this country and others died or suffered to free Kuwait but, now, a year later, 1,053 Kuwaitis are still being held by Saddam Hussein. I have spoken to families who were prisoners of war and had to leave relatives behind when they returned to Kuwait, so they know that they were alive.
In addition, the Kuwaiti Government, whom we saved and restored, are discriminating against members of the New Democracy Movement there and are refusing to allow observers to ensure that the elections are fair. I hope that we can have a debate about that, because we need to expose the hypocrisy of the Kuwaiti Government and we need to achieve true democracy as the United Nations intended.

Mr. MacGregor: It would not be right for me to comment in business questions on the issues that the hon. Gentleman has raised, but I recognise the importance of having a debate on Kuwait at some point. The difficulty is simply that many important issues are being raised, and at the request of the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs we shall discuss Yugoslavia in next week's estimates debate. It is just a question of if and when one can fit a debate in.

Dr. John Reid: May I first express regret that the Leader of the House lowered himself by replying to what was obviously a planted personalised and

despicable attack on the spouse of a politician? I do not think that that speaks volumes for his confidence about the forthcoming election.
May we have a statement next week on the Government's attitude, especially the Prime Minister's, to national stadiums? We welcome the fact that £55 million may be made available for a stadium in Manchester, but is the Leader of the House aware that meetings have been held and repeated requests made to people up to and including the Prime Minister, by myself and colleagues from Lanarkshire, for a commercially viable proposition for a new national football stadium in Lanarkshire, which would service all sports, would create 3,000 jobs and would require finance, private sector led, of less than £20 million—less than half the amount needed for Manchester? May we have a statement to explain why that cannot be provided, as it would create jobs and an unparalleled resource in Scotland? Only £3·5 million is offered for the patch-up job that is to be done on Hampden.

Mr. MacGregor: I do read newspapers, and I was aware of the report to which my hon. Friend the Member for Hendon, South (Mr. Marshall) referred. [Interruption.] I will tell the hon. Gentleman why. I think that it speaks volumes for my dislike of hypocrisy. It was perfectly right to draw that issue to the House's attention.
On the hon. Gentleman's second point, Manchester made a specific bid for the Olympics and it was right for my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister to consider it. I am well aware of the working party on Lanarkshire and of the significant sums that are being proposed and spent in the area. I agree that it is right to do so because of the particular difficulties that have been created by the need to restructure the Lanarkshire economy.

Pension Rebates Review

The Secretary of State for Social Security (Mr. Tony Newton): With permission, I wish to make a statement on the outcome of the regular five-yearly review on the level of national insurance rebates for people contracting out of the state earnings-related pension scheme—SERPS—and on our plans to build on the huge success of personal pensions introduced in 1988 in extending individual choice, opportunity and ownership.
In respect of the contracted-out rebates, I have today laid the relevant reports by the Government Actuary and myself, with a draft amending order and regulations, to establish the level of rebates for the period beginning in April 1993, which need to be set within the present financial year in accordance with the Social Security Pensions Act 1975 and the Social Security Act 1986.
As the House knows, employment which is contracted out of SERPS attracts a rebate on class 1 national insurance contributions. For the five years from April 1988 to April 1993, it is set at 5·8 per cent. of earnings between the lower and upper earnings limits—2 per cent. on the employee's contributions and 3·8 per cent. on the employer's. The rebate is based on the cost to salary-related occupational pension schemes of providing the guaranteed minimum pension which such schemes must provide as the condition of contracting out.
An additional 2 per cent. incentive is payable from the national insurance fund to people in occupational pension schemes which newly contract out of SERPS between 1988 and 1993 and to people who contract out of SERPS in favour of a personal pension. That 2 per cent. incentive ends in April 1993.
The level of rebate required to provide guaranteed minimum pensions in contracted-out schemes is, naturally, falling, because the cost of the transitional arrangements that we introduced for older employees as part of our 1988 pensions reforms reduces in each new quinquennium as those people reach pension age. In the consultation paper issued last autumn, the Government Actuary indicated his initial view that the appropriate rate for 1993 to 1998 would be 4·68 per cent. In his final report to me, following extensive consultation, he has concluded that the range of uncertainties caused by the European Court of Justice Barber judgment concerning equal treatment in occupational pension schemes, which will take some time to resolve, make it more sensible for the rebate level to be based on the costs for the first three years of the period only, which he assesses at 4·77 per cent.
I accept his view and his recommended figure, subject only to rounding the figure to 4·8 per cent. Accordingly the regulations laid today provide for a rebate at that level from April 1993. I propose that it should be split 1·8 per cent. for employees and 3 per cent. for employers.
In my statement to the House about the Barber judgment on 26 June last year, I said that we would be consulting the pensions industry and other interested parties on the implications of equal treatment for the current arrangements for contracting out. Those consultations are under way, and it is clear that changes will be needed to the basis on which pension schemes can contract out of SERPS. In considering what those changes should be, we intend now to give particular consideration to the scope for moving from flat-rate rebates to rebates

related to age, at least for personal pensions and possibly also for other contracted-out schemes. Decisions on how to achieve equality in state pension age, on which I published a discussion paper in December, will also have an important bearing on the many complex and detailed issues which will need to be resolved.
In carrying forward this work, our aim will be to ensure a sound basis for the continued operation and development of salary-related schemes and to expand further the new opportunities for millions of people created by our changes in the 1980s, which opened the way to contracted-out money purchase schemes and personal pensions and gave greater scope for individuals to enhance their retirement provision with additional voluntary contributions.
Personal pensions in particular have proved an outstanding success. More than 4·6 million people have chosen to save for their retirement by contracting out of SERPS in that way, taking advantage of the choice, flexibility and portability which such pensions can provide. Many of them would not have had access to an occupational scheme, and they also include many who would not previously have planned ahead for retirement in this way.
The flat-rate nature of the rebate has, however, meant that the advantages of personal pensions have been greater for younger people than for older ones. As I said earlier in my statement, we intend to examine the scope for age-related rebates more generally. Meanwhile, however, we have decided that it would be right to take an early step in that direction in relation to personal pensions. Accordingly, we propose that from April 1993 there should be an age-related additional rebate of 1 per cent. over and above the basic 4·8 per cent. contracted-out rebate for personal pension holders aged 30 or over.
This is a further important step in encouraging the development of personal saving for retirement. Coupled with our firm and continuing commitment to the basic rate retirement pension, protected in value, it will, I believe, be welcomed in the House and outside.

Mr. Michael Meacher: Will the Secretary of State tell the House what he pointedly omitted to tell it? What is the cost of the 1 per cent. bribe for private pensions which he is announcing for people aged 30 or more who will be given age-related rebates? Will he confirm that the bribe will cost about £600 million over five years, which is equivalent to more than £350 for every pensioner on income support?
Will the Secretary of State also confirm that the whole package will cost £7·1 billion of taxpayers' money now in order to save about £4 billion in reduced benefits at some stage in the next century, so the net cost is more than £3 billion, which is equal to £300 for every pensioner in the land? Why did not the right hon. Gentleman's statement acknowledge that the National Audit Office and the Public Accounts Committee have strongly condemned—[Interruption.] I notice that Conservative Members do not like to be reminded of the degree of the bribe being given by the Government in this pre-election period or of the losses to ordinary pensioners.
Will the Secretary of State confirm that the National Audit Office and the Public Accounts Committee have strongly condemned him for wasting nearly £9·5 billion of public money in the past five years in order to save only £3·5 billion in reduced benefits, and for losing another


£800 million in tax revenue? Will he confirm that he was also castigated for so depleting the national insurance fund by those manoeuvres that he has had to transfer nearly £2 billion of national insurance expenditure to general taxation, and that that is the equivalent of about 1½p on the basic rate of tax?
Is not it clear that, not only in the Budget but 12 days beforehand, the Government are hell-bent on bribing people with everyone else's money—including that of the poorest people? The Government say that they believe in choice, but is not it clear that they choose sweeteners for a select group of private pensioners at the expense of nearly 2 million of today's pensioners who are left in poverty? How can the Secretary of State justify spending £600 million on private pensions when an ordinary single pensioner has seen his or her pension cut by more than £17 a week, compared with Labour's earnings formula?
Why does the right hon. Gentleman feel that it is so necessary to bribe people to join private pension schemes? Is it because private pensions cannot compete with occupational pensions or with SERPS? Why does not the right hon. Gentleman treat SERPS, occupational pensions and private pensions on a fair and equal basis, so that people can choose the best value for money, rather than being manipulated into the Government's preferred ideological option?
Before the Secretary of State asks what Labour will do, I shall tell him that we shall abolish the current 2 per cent. bribe, and that we shall not implement the new I per cent. bribe in April 1993. Our priority is today's pensioners, who are in far greater need and who have been treated so shabbily by the Government for the past 13 years.
The Government's package is an abuse of public funds. It bribes people to join expensive and highly risky private pension schemes and cheats today's pensioners of money that they need. They have a right to that money, and we shall ensure that they get it.

Mr. Newton: The hon. Gentleman's last remarks did not surprise me in the least. They were absolutely in line with his party's relentless hostility to almost every extension of choice and ownership, whether in housing, in shares or, as now, in pensions. More to the point, I should like to know what the hon. Gentleman means by saying that he would abolish the 2 per cent. incentive. That is due to come to an end at the end of the forthcoming financial year in any event. He could abolish it, and change the status quo, only by taking away commitments that have already been made and taken into account in existing pension contracts, thus retrospectively disturbing arrangements that people had already entered. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will wish to clarify that matter at some stage.
I cannot confirm, because I do not fully recognise some of the figures that the hon. Gentleman used, what he said about the cost to the national insurance fund. However, I can tell him that as a result of the rebate which I have announced—the basic rebate from April 1993, combined with the disappearance of the 2 per cent. incentive and the addition of the 1 per cent. age-related addition for people over 30—there will be a substantial reduction in expenditure on rebates from the national insurance fund, arising principally, of course, from the reduction in the basic contracted-out rebate.
The last point on which I want to touch goes to the heart of the hon. Gentleman's comments and his hostility

to the rebate system. The figures that he uses persistently include the basic contracted-out rebate as well as the personal pensions incentive——

Mr. Meacher: That is what the National Audit Office says.

Mr. Newton: I heard that. I wonder whether the hon. Gentleman has read what the Institute of Fiscal Studies —usually one of his favourite bodies—said last week about the NAO report:
The majority of the cost of personal pensions arose from the cost of the contracted-out rebate"—
the basic rebate introduced by the Labour Government in the mid-1970s. The institute continued:
An obvious corollary of the NAO's argument that the cost of personal pensions was excessive is that the cost to the National Insurance Fund of rebates to occupational pension schemes is also excessive.
If, as I suspect, that is the hon. Gentleman's view, he should come clean. He will not be happy until there is no alternative to state provision and whatever the state decides to provide.

Several Hon. Members: rose——

Mr. Speaker: Order. I know that this is an important statement, but we have an equally important debate on Welsh affairs today. I will allow questions to go on until 4.55 pm; then we really must move on because I will have to put a limit on speeches in any event in the Welsh debate.

Sir Robert McCrindle: Is not it clear that personal pensions represent one of the greatest successes of the Government, and that as a result of their introduction millions of our fellow citizens enjoy the prospect of a very good pension? That has been brought about by the incentives that are so deplored by the Opposition. My right hon. Friend will find that there are many Conservative Members sitting behind him who will warmly endorse what he has done in the past and even more warmly endorse today's news that the 1 per cent. rebate will apply on an age-related basis.
Finally, is not it clear from what the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Meacher) said that the millions of people who have become holders of personal pensions over the past few years will wish to know whether his remarks imply that there is to be some retrospective action by an incoming Labour Government which would not only show Labour's well-known opposition to the concept of personal pensions but put in jeopardy the pensions which have been built up over the past five years?

Mr. Newton: Taking my hon. Friend's last point first, it is certainly true, if the words of the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Meacher) meant what they appeared to mean, that they would involve depriving average personal pension holders of about £5 a week of contributions to their personal pensions which they have already committed.

Mr. Meacher: Bribery.

Mr. Newton: I take that sedentary observation as confirming what I say—it is precisely the commitment made in the last shadow Budget. We all wait with bated breath for the next shadow Budget.
I am grateful for my hon. Friend's earlier observations, which were entirely true. We have enabled millions of people who were not in occupational pension schemes to


embark on a new form of saving for their retirement, a form which gives them greater flexibility and choice. What is more, there are some signs, admittedly from limited survey information, that about 40 per cent. of those people are putting more than the rebate into their personal pension schemes. In other words, this has had an important effect in stimulating personal saving for retirement.

Mr. Archy Kirkwood: The Secretary of State knows that I do not share the hostility emanating from the Opposition Front-Bench spokesman, the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Meacher), to private pensions. But may I repeat the question that the hon. Gentleman sought to ask? What is the Government Actuary's assessment of the cost of the 1 per cent. additional rebate? I well understand the reason for trying to include an age-related element, but, without the 1 per cent., would not that have been equally possible by using a figure of less than 4·8 per cent. for those under 30 and more than 4 per cent. for those over 30?

Mr. Newton: The estimate of the cost to the national insurance fund of the 1 per cent. additional rebate that I have proposed is about £175 million a year. Against that, savings of the better part of £2 billion a year will arise from the other changes which I announced today—including my confirmation of the fact that the 2 per cent. incentive will disappear in April 1993. I hope that that is reasonably clear.
On the wider point that the hon. Gentleman raised, I reiterate that I am grateful for his general support for extending choice and opportunity in the way that we have sought to do.

Mr. Anthony Nelson: If the growing number of elderly people are to be assured of a decent pension in future without placing an impossible taxation burden on the rest of the work force, bearing in mind that pensions are paid for on an annual basis, is not it essential that personal pension provision is increased and is not it right that the Government have come forward with this welcome statement, which amounts not to a bribe but to a much-needed bonus for self-reliance and self-provision?

Mr. Newton: Yes. I obviously very much agree with my hon. Friend. The fact that 4·5 million of our fellow citizens have taken advantage of those opportunities, together with many more in company-operated money purchase schemes—of which 20,000 have been created since 1988 —shows that that is meeting a widespread wish for people to make more choices for themselves and to have more say over their own provision for retirement. That will be welcomed generally almost everywhere, except among Opposition Front-Bench Members, as a sensible way to proceed.

Mr. Frank Field: As someone who is committed to free choice—whether to belong to one's trade union at GCHQ, to buy one's own council house or to have control over one's pension assets—may I return the Secretary of State to the costs of the proposals? What was the cost in respect of the national insurance fund of the rebate during the first five years and what is it in the second

five years? Or, in this pre-election period, is the statement that there is no such thing as a free lunch being put to one side?

Mr. Newton: I have given the figures requested by the hon. Member for Roxburgh and Berwickshire (Mr. Kirkwood). The House must focus on the extent to which, as a result of the kick-start that we have provided through the incentive introduced in 1988, there has been a massive expansion in the number of people saving for their own retirement and, as I said a moment ago, many people now put in more money than they receive from the rebate itself. I have no doubt that that is in the interests of the development of a sound, long-term structure for pension provision, for reasons that were made clear in the supplementary question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Chichester (Mr. Nelson).

Mr. Patrick Nicholls: Does my right hon. Friend agree that, when those people who are thinking of contracting out consider the exchanges that have taken place in the House today, they would do well to bear in mind that the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Meacher) was quoted in The Star on 28 August 1991 as saying that there was no way in which any political party would commit itself to a common retirement age of 60 because the cost would be enormous? Does not that show that when the hon. Member for Oldham, West has a choice between common sense and party dogma, at the end of the day, he will always opt for party dogma?

Mr. Newton: I can confirm that. If we had required confirmation other than from me—and I suppose that people might expect me to confirm that—that was all too clear in the response of the hon. Member for Oldham, West to my statement this afternoon.

Mr. David Winnick: Is the Secretary of State aware that the erosion and undermining of SERPS have caused immense damage to those who will retire in future and will undoubtedly mean that, despite what he has said, many people will have to live in poverty unless —as we hope—a Labour Government reverse what he has done? Is there not a lesson to be learnt from what has happened with the Mirror pension scheme which is, admittedly, an occupational scheme? Theft and swindle in that scheme have meant that many pensioners simply do not know whether they will have a decent retirement. What has happened could happen elsewhere in occupational pension schemes or in the kind of schemes to which the Secretary of State referred.

Mr. Newton: I do not accept either of those points. The changes that we made to SERPS in 1988 were a necessary part of putting pension provision on a basis that was sound for the future and that was likely to be affordable by future generations. The worst thing one can do in respect of pensions is to make promises, upon which people rely, about what would be paid in 30 or 40 years time, but which prove to be unsustainable.
If I understood the other part of the hon. Gentleman's question alright, where people are members of a contracted-out scheme whereby the undertaking is to ensure guaranteed minimum pensions, in the relevant circumstances such schemes are underwritten by the state.

Mr. Michael Irvine: Does my right hon. Friend agree that, in the light of the appalling fraud


perpetrated on the pensioners of the Maxwell-controlled companies, the case for personal pensions is stronger, because with personal pensions it is up to the individual pensioner to choose who manages that pension and in whom to place his or her trust?

Mr. Newton: There is certainly a wide range of advantages in money purchase schemes generally and in personal pension schemes in particular. The Government are trying to achieve, and have done so successfully, a wider spread of different kinds of opportunity for people to make provision for their retirement.

Mr. Derek Enright: The Secretary of State will be aware that many of the assets of the pension fund of the Mirror Group are in the possession of the banks. Is he willing to order the banks to restore those assets, or will he let them get away with that bare-faced robbery?

Mr. Newton: The hon. Gentleman will realise that I have no power to order the banks to do anything. However, he will have noted the observations of some of the banks over the past few days. I cannot embroider on them or add to them.

Mr. Tim Smith: Is my right hon. Friend aware that his statement is most welcome, not only because it builds on the huge success of personal pensions but because it introduces for the first time the concept of an age-related rebate? Is not it clear that the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Meacher) is against variety in pension provision and against choice in pension provision and wants to destroy personal pensions? Not content with that, did not he make it clear when we debated occupational pensions in 1990 that he wanted to impose such huge burdens on occupational schemes that many employers would withdraw altogether?

Mr. Newton: That is absolutely clear. One of the remarks in that regard, about which the hon. Member for Oldham, West is no doubt proudest although I do not think that he has said it since, is his remark of 20 June 1990 that the Labour party planned to
turn the pensions market on its head.
That is a fine way of guaranteeing people security in retirement.

Mr. Dennis Skinner: Is not the truth of the matter that the electors will be bewildered by a Government who reckon that they are strapped for cash and who will have a public sector borrowing requirement of £30 billion after the Budget but who are handing out £6 billion to a small group of people from the pockets of others? Who is going to benefit? Those who will benefit are the merchant banker Tory Members of Parliament, some of whom have spoken today, and insurance companies that give money to the Tory party so that it can fight elections. That is not only bribery; it is hypocrisy as well.

Mr. Newton: I think that the hon. Gentleman might study the whole package of changes that were made in 1988 to which he referred. He might also just remember that I have made it clear several times this afternoon that the net result of what I have set out, including the necessary adjustment of the basic contracted-out rebate, is not a large increase in expenditure.

Mr. John Greenway: My right hon. Friend's statement will be warmly welcomed by the pensions industry which has been greatly concerned about the problem of older pension contributors opting back into SERPS because of the current arrangements. I doubt whether the pensions industry would have been as pleased with the hostility towards the industry shown by the Opposition.
On a technical point, I welcome my right hon. Friend's commitment to an age-related rebate in future. Will he ensure that, in due course, those provisions are taken together at the same time as his proposals for a state pension age which is the same for men and for women? The two will not work unless they are carried out together.

Mr. Newton: If my hon. Friend reads my statement carefully—it was admittedly a rather long paragraph—he will register that I have linked in one paragraph the action that will need to be taken in the wake of the Barber judgment in respect of occupational pension schemes, the action that will need to be taken following discussion on the state pension age, and the examination of age-related rebates. I certainly note my hon. Friend's point. He and many others will recognise that, if it is possible to find a way through more generally on age-related debates, it would be a significant further improvement in the whole structure of pension provision.

Sir Anthony Durant: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the Government's pensions policy has encouraged many much younger people to take up pensions and those on much lower incomes to take out personal policies?

Mr. Newton: Yes. My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Personal pensions have proved particularly popular among young people with relatively modest incomes. Typically, the personal pension holder receives about three quarters of average earnings. Fifty per cent. of them are under 30 and 80 per cent. of them are under 40. As I said in my statement, I regard as one of the great merits of personal pensions the fact that large numbers of people who historically would not have been thinking ahead and planning for retirement—we all remember the old Pearl Assurance advertisement—have started to do so. That is a major gain.

Mr. David Shaw: When my right hon. Friend was doing his most excellent research for his wonderful statement, which will be warmly welcomed by those with personal pensions, did he look at the Labour party policy document that proposes new controls on the way in which private pension funds and other moneys are invested? Does my right hon. Friend agree that such proposals would reduce investment returns for those with private pensions and that, in consequence, under a Labour Government, private pensioners would be very much worse off?

Mr. Newton: It must inescapably follow that the policy that my hon. Friend describes would have that effect. Of course, it would make very little difference to personal pensioners, because the Opposition would stop them having their personal pensions.

Points of Order

Mr. Alex Salmond: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. As you will remember, at business questions the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Wallace) and I asked the Leader of the House whether he could give us any information on a supposed decommissioning scheme for the fishing industry. The Leader of the House replied that he could give us no such information. The entire Scottish press corps believes that such a statement will be made at 5 o'clock in Scotland by the relevant Minister. Will Government Front Bench Members tell us what is going on? Is there to be a statement or is there not to be a statement? In this pre-election panic, why are the Government so anxious to avoid scrutiny by hon. Members in this Chamber?

Mr. James Wallace: Further to that point of order, Mr. Speaker. You will recall that, in reply to me, the Leader of the House suggested that a general conservation package was still being considered. If it is true that a statement is to be made in the next 10 to 15 minutes, it is very unlikely that such a package was still being considered as recently as an hour ago. I have a high regard for the Leader of the House and I am sure that he would not wish to mislead the House by suggesting that the Government are at sixes and sevens. At the very least, I know that you, Mr. Speaker, deprecate the idea of making statements to the press when, first and foremost, they should be made in this place.

Mr. Speaker: An opportunity may arise tomorrow if such a statement is made in Scotland.

Mr. Bob Cryer: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. You may recall that during business questions I raised the issue of the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food placing 650 letters on the Board. They were all stamped. Normally, hon. Members are limited to six letters on the Board every day. On what basis can the Minister use the Board in that way? It seems quite wrong. Any statement by the Minister can be made at the Dispatch Box. It should not be necessary for Ministers to abuse the facilities of the House in that way. In particular, when we recently considered the Wild Mammals (Protection) Bill, which the Minister voted against, he could have made a statement without filling the Board with material for hon. Members.
The matter is important because, in the period before the election, if every Minister takes the opportunity to spend taxpayers' money in that way, we shall be inundated. I assume that the Minister is using his power to abuse his position. Do the rules apply to the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food in the same way as they apply to other hon. Members, or are Ministers entitled to commit such abuse?

Mr. Speaker: I understand that, following an application by the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food early this morning stating that letters were required to be delivered urgently today to each Member of the House, they were accepted for handling by the Members' letter board. I am informed that the correct

postage was paid on all those letters, should they need to be forwarded to Members. I have not had an opportunity of studying the letter, but I think this procedure might be examined by the Administration Committee in future.

Mr. Cryer: I am grateful for your response, Mr. Speaker, but I assure you that I have examined the letter —presumably you also received one—and there is absolutely nothing of any urgency about it. That suggests that Officers of the House have been misled by the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food claiming that urgency was the key matter in terms of using the internal facilities of the House.

Mr. Derek Enright: I have a copy here.

Mr. Speaker: I have not had a chance to read it yet. I can dispose of the matter by saying that I will certainly look into it.

Mr. Anthony Nelson: Further to that point of order, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: I do not think I need to hear it. I shall look into the matter now.

Mr. Nelson: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. As you are looking into the matter—I am grateful for that assurance—the issue on which many hon. Members receive the most correspondence is animal welfare. That excellent and informative letter was very gratefully received by me and many colleagues. It was excellent that the Minister sent it to us.

Mr. Stuart Bell: Further to that point of order, Mr. Speaker. I fully accept your assurance. I received that letter early today and I went immediately to the Serjeant at Arms to complain. It is a very important and sensitive matter. Animal welfare is an important subject, but the letter was not urgent. It will simply encumber hon. Members' pockets for the rest of the day. I am sure that most hon. Members will never read it. It might be worth taking that point into account during your consideration.

Mr. Speaker: Hon. Members sometimes complain that they have not received information before they depart for their constituencies at a weekend, so the matter needs to be balanced. I have no idea how urgent the letter was.

Mr. Dennis Skinner: Let us face it, Mr. Speaker—you have not seen the letter, but it was sent to 650 Members of Parliament using first class stamps. That equals £117. One hundred and seventeen quid has been spent by the Ministry—not by the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. The suggestion was that the Minister paid for it out of his own pocket, but he did not. It has come out of the taxpayer's pocket. The letter states that the Government have great concern about animal welfare, but they did not think about that when we debated the Bill to get rid of fox hunting. The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food talks about furry animals: he was stuffing a dead furry animal down his son's throat on the telly.

Mr. Speaker: I think that we had better move on.

Welsh Affairs

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Sackville.]

Mr. Speaker: I should announce to the House that, in view of the late start of the debate and the number of right hon. and hon. Members who wish to participate, I propose to put a precautionary limit of 10 minutes on speeches between 7 pm and 9 pm. If hon. Members who are called before that time are brief, it may be possible, in the general interests of the House, to relax that limit.

The Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. David Hunt): This annual St. David's day debate on Welsh affairs is traditionally a time for reviewing the most important events that have happened in Wales over the past year, and also a time for looking forward and assessing prospects for the future. Before I refer to developments in Wales over the past year, I pause to express the regret that I am sure that we all feel that, since the last time we met on this occasion, my dear friend the late hon. Member for Monmouth, Sir John Stradling Thomas, is no longer with us, and the right hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent (Mr. Foot), the hon. Member for Meirionnydd Nant Conwy (Dr. Thomas), and my hon. Friends the Members for Clwyd, North-West (Sir A. Meyer) and for Delyn (Mr. Raffan) are retiring at the general election. They have all served the House with great distinction and we shall be very sad to lose them.
It is impossible in the time available for me to deal with everything that has happened in Wales in the past year. However, I should like to touch on several subjects. Some topics, such as transport, will be dealt with by my right hon. Friend the Minister of State later in the debate if he catches your eye, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Other subjects have been extensively debated in either the Welsh Grand Committee or the Welsh Affairs Select Committee. Most recently, we had an excellent debate on education a fortnight ago in the Welsh Grand Committee.

Mr. Dafydd Wigley: We are not certain whether there will be any further opportunity to discuss Welsh affairs between now and the election, which may well be called in a couple of weeks, but it has been suggested that before then there could be another meeting of the Welsh Grand Committee to discuss important questions about the future structures of government in Wales. Are we likely to have that opportunity? Clearly, if we are not, those matters will have to be included in this debate. Some guidance on that would be helpful.

Mr. Hunt: I heard the hon. Gentleman raise that matter with my right hon. Friend the Lord President of the Council a few moments ago. I hope that we shall meet to debate devolution in the Welsh Grand Committee, and have that meeting in Wales, before the next general election. However, I readily accept that it must be done by agreement. I understand that discussions are continuing through the usual channels, and I hope that they can come to an early conclusion.

Mr. Keith Raffan: Of course, it is two weeks since my right hon. Friend raised this matter in the Welsh Grand Committee. He said that discussions were continuing through the usual channels. Does that mean that one of the Opposition parties is creating an

obstruction to holding the debate and delaying it? I am sure that my right hon. Friend is being diplomatic, but will he confirm that that may be so?

Mr. Hunt: To be termed diplomatic by my hon. Friend is a compliment indeed. I used to be a usual channel, so I know that I must not trespass into that area, except to say that I hope that discussions will come to a successful conclusion as soon as possible.
The performance of the United Kingdom economy has been the background to events in Wales in the past year. I freely admit that things have been difficult. The world economy has been in recession, as has the United Kingdom economy. Wales could not possibly be isolated from those outside influences. However, our confidence in the underlying strength of the Welsh economy has been fully justified. The gap between Welsh and United Kingdom unemployment rates has continued to narrow in the past year. The latest available figures show that, for the first time in many years, average wages increased faster in Wales than in the rest of the United Kingdom.
Most encouraging of all, companies still want very much to invest in Wales. The year 1991 was particularly successful for inward investment. The 183 projects recorded promised more than 17,000 new or safeguarded jobs and more than £860 million of investment.

Mr. Roy Hughes: Will the Secretary of State confirm that, as from 26 April, charges on the Severn bridge will be collected only from westbound traffic? Will he also confirm that tolls for motor cars will increase to £2·80, for minibuses to £5·60 and for lorries to £8·40? Does he appreciate the damage that that is likely to do to employment and investment prospects, let alone the Welsh tourist trade? Will the Secretary of State take a particular interest in my constituents in Caldicot, Magor, Rogiet and Undy, who took the advice of the right hon. Member for Chingford (Mr. Tebbit) and got on their bikes to seek employment on the other side of the estuary? All told, does the Secretary of State agree that the charges are a severe, major—with a capital M—blow to the Welsh economy?

Mr. Hunt: A few moments ago, Mr. Speaker asked all hon. Members to keep their speeches short. I said that my right hon. Friend the Minister of State would deal with transport if he managed to catch your eye, Mr. Deputy Speaker, but I am happy to respond to the hon. Gentleman. The Labour party has never opposed tolls. If I recall, it imposed them. All the issues have been debated at great length. The good news for Wales is that we are to have a second Severn crossing and that will be complete in 1995. That is very good news.
Many major international companies have demonstrated and underlined their confidence in the future of Wales by establishing manufacturing operations in our country. It is even more encouraging that, once established, they stay and expand their operations. For example, the announcement by Sony last May of its expansion at Bridgend was one of the major industrial landmarks of the year. The initial phase alone will create 1,400 new jobs, with potential to generate many more. That is good news for Mid-Glamorgan and for Wales.
Before the hon. Member for Newport, East (Mr. Hughes) interrupted me, I was about to say that I wanted to take this opportunity to thank everyone who played a part in securing that record inward investment into Wales. Of course, it is not just a matter of the Government. In


Wales we have a positive partnership in which local and central Government, the public and private sector and the many agencies come together to stress the benefits of investing in Wales. They have as their trump card the quality of the work force in Wales. I praise everyone who has taken a great deal of time and trouble to enable us to win that record level of investment.
What is particularly heartening about the projects which have come to Wales, and the indigenous companies that have expanded their operations, is the diverse nature of the operations involved. They represent the future for Wales and the growing divergence of the economy.

Dr. Kim Howells: Is the Secretary of State aware that there are grave worries in Wales that we do not possess a statistical database on our strengths and weaknesses to enable us to attract the next generation of investment from abroad into Wales? That was highlighted in the report by the Comptroller and Auditor General which was discussed recently by the Public Accounts Committee. It said that we did not have a sufficiently rigorous database to tell us the real effect of the valleys programme and other programmes. Will the Secretary of State do something about that and improve it?

Mr. Hunt: Yes, I should like to improve it. We are extremely rigorous in the payment of regional selective assistance, which is paid only in relation to the numbers of jobs created. However, it is important to improve the database. I know that I could say that one need only go down the M4 and A55 to see the new factories and new opportunities, but we need to do more than that. We need to identify the strengths and weaknesses. My predecessor did that with the financial services initiative and a range of other initiatives. I seek to do the same in other areas. But the hon. Gentleman is right: we would benefit greatly from improving the statistical base. I must continually balance the cost of obtaining the information against the benefit. However, I believe that it is right to improve the position.

Mr. Alex Carlile: The Secretary of State said something which we in mid-Wales are a little tired of hearing. He mentioned the M4 and the A55. Of course we welcome what has happened along those belts. However, there is an awful lot of Wales in between the two. In the rest of his speech, will he bear it in mind that unemployment in Powys has increased by 30 per cent. in the past year? We feel that, despite the great efforts of the Development Board for Rural Wales, the area is somewhat neglected by the Welsh Office.

Mr. Hunt: That is interesting. I was about to come to that in my speech, but I will deal with it now.

Mr. Ted Rowlands: Will the Secretary of State give way?

Mr. Hunt: Wait a moment. I ought to reply to the hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. Carlile).
I spent some time at Welshpool just a few days ago. I went to see the site of the new Fisher-Gauge factory. The hon. and learned Gentleman will know that I went to see Bill Fisher in Peterborough in the state of Ontario in Canada. I applaud him for the fact that he decided to come to mid-Wales even though he had many other locations to consider, including some in our competitor countries in the

EC. I was particularly pleased at the way in which everyone came together to secure that inward investment. Just as I was delighted by the help of the hon. Member for Caernarfon (Mr. Wigley) over inward investment by the Diagnostic Products Corporation of Los Angeles at Llanberis, I am equally delighted by Fisher-Gauge.
We intend to do our utmost to bring much-needed investment to all of Wales. When I was first appointed Secretary of State, I said that I wanted prosperity to spread to all parts of Wales. That is still my determination. I hope that Welsh prosperity will never again be threatened by over-reliance on a few industries.

Mr. Rowlands: Before he heads for mid-Wales, will the right hon. Gentleman pause at Merthyr for a moment? I wish to draw his attention to the depressing and sad fact that next month could be celebrated by a two-week lay-off at Hoover. That experience will be shared by workers at Hotpoint and the people in the Minister of State's constituency. After 10 years of technological investment, changes in work practices, alterations and 4,000 job losses —that is equivalent to losing a steelworks—people are still having to face a two-week lay-off. Is that the economic miracle that we were expecting?

Mr. Hunt: I know that the hon. Gentleman may feel it necessary to stress the bad side, but—[HON. MEMBERS: "Come on—answer."]—There are some positive sides to Merthyr. There has been an announcement that yet another Japanese company, and the first company to come in from Singapore, will fill those two factories. He and I were present at the launch of the east Merthyr reclamation scheme. There is a great deal of activity.
I cannot insulate Wales—nor can my ministerial colleagues, the Welsh Office or anyone else in Wales—against the effects of the recession outside, which has hit the white goods sector in particular. I do not think that hon. Members would expect anything else. Hotpoint, Hoover and other such companies are feeling the effects of the downturn in consumer spending, and I hope that that is a short-term problem.
Why are people still so anxious to invest in Wales? There are a number of reasons. One is the quality of the work force, which has the skills required by investing companies. That brings me to the first major development of the year that I wish to mention. Last September, the Prime Minister announced that responsibility for training would transfer to the Welsh Office from the Department of Employment. That transfer will take effect from 1 April.
From then on, the Welsh Office will be a training, education and enterprise Department. That will present us with an unprecedented opportunity to develop our people's potential. We also now have a full network of training and enterprise councils, drawing on the energy of local employers to develop the skill base. We issued strategic guidance to our TECs in November, which set a challenging agenda and I hope emphasised our determination to ensure that everyone is working in harness to develop the skills and enterprise of our people.
The TECs are prime examples of our policy of allowing those most closely involved with an activity to share responsibility for directing and undertaking it. I have sought to adopt that approach in other areas of community activity. I am especially pleased with the progress being made under the special initiative for the programme for the valleys, to encourage community


involvement in social and economic regeneration. Those include the community revival strategies, in which five communities are benefiting from projects which encourage the environmental, social and economic regeneration of those communities.

Mr. Peter Hain: Could the Minister confirm that the Prime Minister has turned him over on his proposal for an economic forum for Wales, as suggested in his reorganisation of local government pamphlet, and that Downing street is blocking his proposal for economic regeneration work?

Mr. Hunt: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving me a chance to repudiate a totally incorrect story. The proposal, which was put forward by the Council of Welsh Districts, is still under consideration; I have not yet reached a conclusion on it.
I recognise that, in recent weeks, there has been increasing interest in the issue of a Welsh assembly. The Conservative party certainly has everything to gain by widening the debate on devolution. I do not regard the forum as part of that debate.
Some of the most telling and the best arguments against a Cardiff-based Welsh assembly were made in the 1970s by the right hon. Member for Islwyn (Mr. Kinnock), the Leader of the Opposition. Perhaps he has not changed his views on the subject of an assembly, which would go some way towards explaining some of the mess and muddle on the part of the Welsh Labour party, not only about whether they would impose an assembly on Wales but, if they did, about what it would be able to do.
I shall read one page. The Leader of the Opposition said that a Welsh assembly would not
provide a factory, a machine or job, build a school, train a doctor or put a pound on pensions.
We have calculated that a Welsh assembly would cost £1 million per week. The right hon. Gentleman also said:
Who is prepared to give up £1 million to be bossed about by an institution in Cardiff?
He also said:
A new slab of Government in the form of a Welsh assembly would turn into yet another costly millstone around the necks of the people of Wales.
I agree with those comments, and I agree even more with the right hon. Gentleman's comment that the Welsh assembly would take—[Interruption.] I know that Opposition Members do not like hearing the words of their leader, but I am determined to shove those words into the debate in every possible way.
The right hon. Gentleman said:
that Assembly would take power and money from local authorities and the communities they serve"—
[Interruption.]

Several Hon. Members: rose——

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Harold Walker): Order. We do not conduct our affairs in this way. We debate by means of speech rather than bellowing across the Floor of the House.

Mr. Hunt: I agree with every one of the words that I am quoting from the right hon. Member for Islwyn, who continued:
it would be even more centralised than the present system.
We have a right to know whether he has changed his view.

Mr. Raffan: While historical quotations arc interesting, and the Leader of the Opposition will shortly be history,

my right hon. Friend has given an estimate of the cost of an assembly. Can he also give the House the estimated savings of going to unitary authorities? Does he not agree that the situation has changed totally since the last referendum? The Government must tackle this issue in the current context of the need for a Government of Wales and the need for a strategic authority when we move to unitary authorities.

Mr. Hunt: I shall come to unitary authorities in a moment.

Mr. Geraint Howells: I have listened with interest to the Secretary of State. He started off well when he mentioned devolution. Will he confirm that he has no intention of giving the people of Wales an assembly?

Mr. Hunt: I passed to the hon. Gentleman my only copy of "The Liberal Democrat Pocket Guide to Reform of Government". Could he possibly return that to me at some stage? However, I have a photocopy of it. [HON. MEMBERS: "The Under-Secretary of State has a copy."] I am talking about my copy.
A few days ago, the hon. Member for Ceredigion and Pembroke, North (Mr. Howells) said that I was guilty of misleading the House because I said that the Liberal Democrats would make the post of Secretary of State for Wales redundant, once they had established the Welsh assembly. Page 8 of the pocket guide states:
We would create a Welsh senate for home rule for Wales. The role of Secretary of State for Wales would become redundant.
That is what I told the House, but I was accused of misleading it. I often find the policies of the Liberal Democrats unintelligible, but I think that the hon. Gentleman should understand them.

Mr. Geraint Howells: rose——

Mr. Donald Anderson: rose——

Mr. Hunt: I shall give way.

Mr. Anderson: rose——

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The Secretary of State should make it clear to whom he is giving way.

Mr. Howells: Before the Secretary of State gets too excited, we are talking about the principle of devolving power and not the detail. Will he confirm, once again, that he is in favour of devolving power to the people of Wales? As I said on a television programme last night, it is a great pity that the Secretary of State plays about with a little piece of paper.

Mr. Hunt: It is not just any piece of paper; it is Liberal Democrat policy. If the hon. Gentleman does not know about that piece of paper, it is entitled "The Liberal Democrat Pocket Guide to Reform of Government". I understand that the leader of the Welsh Liberal party told the Western Mail, when told of the document, "Oh dear, I had better check this with a party official." I would hope that members of the Liberal Democrats would at least be in some control of the situation.

Mr. Anderson: The Secretary of State is enjoying himself by reading out comments by the Leader of the Opposition 18 years ago. We could enjoy ourselves by repeating what the Secretary of State said about the poll


tax two years ago. Would it not be better if he were to consider the issues and tried to elevate the debate rather than to indulge in the diversionary tactic of referring to a meeting in Cardiff? Will he say yea or nay to whether, under any circumstances, he will grant an assembly to Wales?

Mr. Hunt: I have made my position clear. The hon. Gentleman may have changed his mind, but has the Leader of the Opposition? We have not yet heard whether he has, and that the right hon. Gentleman owes it to the people of Wales to explain his views on a Welsh assembly.
Does the Leader of the Opposition think that a referendum is still necessary or that an assembly should be established? Does he think, as he has said before, that such an assembly would create divisions in Wales, and not heal them? Does the Leader of the Opposition still believe that the £50 million that would be spent on the assembly, if the Labour party ever came into government, would be better spent on schools and hospitals? The Leader of the Opposition has to justify his series of U-bends and S-turns to the people of Wales. He and the Labour party have been running away from this issue for too long.
The hon. Member for Swansea, East (Mr. Anderson) referred to the diversionary tactic of the Welsh Grand Committee. That is an important Committee of this House, and I want it to meet in Wales and to debate the issue of devolution. If that is not possible, I make it absolutely clear today that I want the Leader of the Opposition to participate with me in a live, televised debate on that subject in the next few weeks. The hon. Member for Caernarfon would agree to participate, and I also know that the hon. Member for Ceredigion and Pembroke, North would. It is time that the Leader of the Opposition set the record straight and stopped standing on his head. The people of Wales have a right to know.
I want to marshal my arguments about a Welsh assembly, but I wonder whether the Leader of the Opposition has any arguments left to marshal.

Mr. Win Griffiths: On the subject of the Welsh Grand Committee meeting outside the House, the Secretary of State will know that, if that is to happen, we need a debate to change the Standing Orders. That is what the Leader of the House said. Is the Secretary of State saying that he is wrong? Did the Secretary of State clear the matter with the Leader of the House to make arrangements smoothly before he threw it at us at a meeting of the Welsh Grand Committee on a day when I had constituents visiting the House?

Mr. Hunt: I do not understand which day the hon. Gentleman is talking about. That was not what I proposed at the Welsh Grand Committee. I did not mention a date. I said that I hoped that it would meet as soon as possible. I wish that the hon. Gentleman would listen to what I said, because, a few moments ago, I said that I had heard the remarks of the Leader of the House. It is possible to reach an agreement, and then it would not be necessary to hold a debate. That is being discussed through the usual channels, and I hope the matter will be resolved quickly.
I believe that we have everything to gain from a wide-ranging debate on the imposition of a Welsh assembly, which would run Wales from Cardiff. [Interruption.] The Opposition may not want to hear the

arguments, but I shall ensure that they are heard by the people of Wales, and I shall seize every opportunity to do that.

Mrs. Ann Clwyd: The right hon. Gentleman is frothing at the mouth so much that I wonder whether he thinks there is something dishonourable in changing one's mind. I wish that more politicians were willing to change their minds and were willing to say so, because there is nothing dishonourable in that. When the referendum on devolution took place, 80 per cent. of the people of Wales were against, but in the recent poll, 47 per cent. said that they were now in favour. Would he describe that as a U-turn as well?

Mr. Hunt: I remind the hon. Lady that, before the referendum campaign took place, more than 40 per cent. of the Welsh were in favour of a Welsh assembly. However, once they heard the arguments, they rejected it by an 80 per cent. majority. I am not calling the right hon. Member for Islwyn dishonourable—I called him the right hon. Gentleman. I just want him to say whether he has changed his mind, but he has refrained from doing so. I challenge him to spell out his party's policy, because many in the House and outside still do not know what it is.
Before hon. Members intervened about the Welsh assembly—I hope that we shall have a wide-ranging debate on that important issue—I was discussing the question of community action. The hon. Member for Cynon Valley (Mrs. Clwyd) will be aware that we have provided funding towards the establishment of the Cynon valley business leadership team and towards its agenda for action programmes in Wales. The purpose of the "Agenda for Action" is to encourage companies and business leaders to support and increase development and prosperity in their local communities. I want to see that sort of approach develop much more widely.
A key part of our economic regeneration strategy is our support for the Cardiff Bay development corporation. The scope offered by the restoration of the old bay area is being recognised by investors. For example, the Prudential insurance company has decided to locate there its new regional headquarters for Wales and the south-west of England which will provide 200 jobs. The completion of the barrage—the legislation is now going through the House—will attract up to 25,000 new jobs and private sector investment of more than £1,000 million. The barrage, when completed, will represent the most prestigious and impressive waterfront development in Europe.
There is a tendency—I believe an erroneous one—to consider economic regeneration only in the context of the old industrial areas, but the rural areas of Wales are of vital importance. It was in recognition of this that, just over a year ago, I launched my rural initiative. As part of that package, I made £15 million available in extra provision for rural programmes, together with an extra £5 million set aside for local authority capital projects. On 9 December 1991, I published a document that set out my objectives for rural Wales, and at the same time I announced a series of related measures. As well as further increases in resources for the Development Board for Rural Wales, the WDA, the Wales tourist board and the Countryside Council, an important element of my announcements was a new competitive programme for local authority capital projects designed for the benefit of


rural communities. I have set £6 million aside for that in 1992–93. The bids for projects under the programme are due in by next Tuesday. As last year, I hope that we shall have the greatest difficulty in deciding on the successful projects.
The key industry of the rural areas is of course agriculture. I fully recognise the difficulties which our farmers are facing at present. I firmly believe that a healthy agricultural sector is vital to the future economic, environmental and social well-being of Wales, and I assure the farmers of Wales that I will do everything in my power to achieve that. I am delighted that I have been able to secure for them the full 10 ecu increase in suckler cow premium funded by the European Community. I was also pleased to note last month that there had been an improvement in farming incomes over the past year, with aggregate net incomes rising by 15 per cent. compared with a fall in the United Kingdom as a whole of 14 per cent.
I have been twice, in the past three months, to see Commissioner MacSharry in Brussels to urge on him the necessity of any reforms in the common agricultural policy being fair to those, like our Welsh hill farmers, who are totally dependent on farming for their income. I promise our farmers that their interests are my interests and that their battle is my battle, and together we shall be heard in Brussels.

Mr. John P. Smith: Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that the MacSharry proposals as they stand would be detrimental to Welsh lowland farmers?

Mr. Hunt: Yes, and I made it clear to Commissioner MacSharry that any reform of the CAP, which I believe must follow the GATT, must be fair to all farmers in the Community and not penalise Welsh farmers in particular.

Mr. Geraint Howells: rose——

Mr. Hunt: I hope that the hon. Gentleman will forgive me for not giving way. I am anxious to make progress.
On my visit to Brussels last week, I pressed Commissioner Millan about the importance of releasing quickly our RECHAR money for support for Britain's coal mining communities. I am delighted that he announced yesterday a package that will provide some £21·1 million for south Wales. That will allow a whole range of further measures to be supported with European assistance, including the regeneration of derelict areas, the further development of small businesses, improving the quality of life, assisting the creation and development of local and community initiatives and the provision of further training in new skills. I have also urged Commissioner Millan to accept an additional bid, which I understand he is now kindly considering.

Mr. Geraint Howells: rose——

Mr. Hunt: I must proceed, because many hon. Members wish to take part in the debate.
There are still in Wales areas which are over-dependent on a small number of employers. Those communities are particularly vulnerable if, for whatever reason, the employer decides to reduce employment in the area. When problems of that sort began accumulating in Holyhead, I asked the Minister of State to take special responsibility for co-ordinating integrated programmes for the regeneration of that area. In recent weeks, a similar

situation has arisen in west Wales, with the decision by the Ministry of Defence—as part of its "Options for Change" rationalisation—to withdraw from Trecwn and to cease flying training from Brawdy.
No one, least of all Welsh Office Ministers, is indifferent to the impact of those decisions on the local economy. We responded immediately by setting up a task force to look at the economic consequences for the area and possible alternative uses, including Ministry of Defence uses, for the two sites. That task force's interim report will be considered by the strategy group, which I shall shortly chair at its first meeting. I am also looking forward to discussing the issue with the Welsh Affairs Committee next week.
Wales does not, and cannot, operate in isolation from Europe and the rest of the world, and that applies not just to our need to attract inward investment, at which we are outstandingly successful. Only last week, I went to Brussels to open the WDA's new offices there, which will provide a focus for Welsh business activity at the heart of the Community, and give interested parties overseas a key point of contact with those in Wales—not just the WDA but local authorities and the training and enterprise councils, which can help them.
I am delighted to have been able to support the Bill of my hon. Friend the Member for Delyn (Mr. Raffan) to provide overseas marketing powers for the Wales tourist board. The Bill is now in another place, having completed its passage through this House. I have every confidence that we shall see it become law before the end of this Parliament.
We have also continued to work at our links with the four motor regions. I visited Stuttgart to meet the Minister President, Mr. Teufel, for talks last October, and my officials have had a number of exchanges with their opposite numbers in Baden-Wurttemberg. My right hon. Friend the Minister of State has visited Milan to discuss closer links with Lombardy, and he and my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary have separately visited Barcelona for four motors-related activities. Next month will see a wide variety of events in a Wales week in Baden-Wurttemberg which will celebrate two positive and successful years of co-operation since we signed our partnership agreement with that region. I also have high hopes for our co-operation with Rhones-Alpes.
Europe is of vital importance, but our regional links also extend to Japan. We have an active partnership with the Oita Prefecture, and I was pleased to welcome Governor Hiramatsu to Wales for the Oita fair in October, where there was a display of the traditional culture and products from that area of Japan. We shall be organising a reciprocal Wales fair in Oita in October this year. This link has already led to orders for Welsh goods and services.
The right hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent will agree that Wales' great forthcoming attraction is the international garden festival at Ebbw Vale. Every time I visit the site, I am more and more impressed and excited by the prospects for the project. The transformation that is taking place on the valley floor and up the hillside is nothing short of remarkable. It will be a marvellous attraction for tourists and business and will do an enormous amount to prove to the rest of the world what we in Wales already know—that the transformation of the valleys is a remarkable event, and that Wales is one of the most attractive places in the United Kingdom in which to live and work.
A key factor in forming our policies in Wales throughout this year has been the principles enunciated by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister when he launched the citizens charter. We have already issued two charters in Wales. The first was the parents charter, which we launched last September, setting out parents' rights and responsibilities in a whole range of education matters. We believe in the right of parents to be effective partners in the education of their children and we intend to equip them to enable them to do that.
We shall also before long be publishing our tenants charter for local authority tenants, and Housing for Wales will issue its guarantee for housing association tenants. Consultation on both of those has now been completed. They will form part not only of our commitment to the citizens charter, but of the objectives which we have set ourselves under the Parliamentary Under-Secretary's document "Housing in Wales—An Agenda for Action".
I am delighted that I have been able to provide extra resources in 1992–93 towards the achievement of those objectives. For local authority housing capital programmes, total provision has been raised to £279 million. That includes an extra £80 million for mandatory home renovation grants, bringing provision up to £140 million.
I was also able for 1991–92 to provide record resources of over £117 million to Housing for Wales, and it is making excellent use of those resources. I have just had the opportunity, in the constituency of the hon. Member for Alyn and Deeside (Mr. Jones), to open the 3,500th house that Housing for Wales has built in the last financial year. I expect the total Housing for Wales programme, including private finance, to amount to over £500 million in the coming three years. Those are major achievements, which will mean that Housing for Wales is making an exceptional start in reaching the targets that we set it in the "Agenda for Action".
I turn to the national health service in Wales, for which we have once again provided record resources in the current and coming year. The past year has seen a number of significant developments. We recently published "Agenda for Action Two," which sets out the key management action required of the NHS over the next three years.
We published also the patients charter for Wales, which has been delivered to all households. It will put the citizens charter initiative into practice in the National Health Service. We shall monitor the performance of health authorities against the charter standards, and health authorities will publish an annual report on their performance.
I was delighted to be able to approve the first national health service trust in Wales. The Pembrokeshire national health service trust will become operational on 1 April 1992. A further 14 health units have been invited to prepare formal applications for trust status in April 1993. Applications need to be submitted by the early summer. If they all decide to proceed, and are successful, that will mean that 65 per cent. of acute health care in Wales will be delivered via NHS trusts. The wide spread of interest in pursuing that option is a telling testimony to the benefits of trust status for those most concerned—the staff and patients.
Investment in the capital estate of health authorities during the life of this Government will be, including the provision for 1992–93, more than £1,261 million.
I am now pleased to be able to announce details of the all-Wales major health capital programme, where I intend to distribute £101 million. A copy of that programme, together with the new arrangements for allocation, has been placed in the Library.
In summary, I propose to provide some £55 million for centrally funded developments, most notably for the provision of a burns and plastic surgery unit at Morriston, the enhancement of adult and paediatric cardiac facilities in south Wales, and for information technology to assist health authorities in furtherance of the implementation of NHS reforms.
The sum of £33·7 million will be provided to meet the on-going cost of major hospital developments in course of construction—most notably at Ysbyty Maelor Wrexham, Ysbyty Glan Clwyd, Royal Gwent, Ysbyty Gwynedd, Brecon War Memorial hospital, University hospital of Wales, Cardiff, and Morriston. Included in that provision is the cost of design fees and construction works on major hospital developments, which will commence on the Ynys-y-Plwm and Baglan bay sites to replace East Glamorgan and Neath and Port Talbot hospitals.
New major works covering the provision of community hospitals, and costing some £6·7 million in 1992–93, will commence at Ebbw Vale, Torfaen, Barry, Cardiff and north Meirionydd. Some £5·2 million will be held in reserve against the possibility of new starts in 1992–93. The funding of those developments will be subject to decisions to be taken on future years' funding as a consequence of this year's public expenditure survey.
That programme has been compiled with the aim of replacing old hospitals that are coming to the end of their useful life. New community hospital developments will provide patient care in a near-domestic environment, close to patients' homes. Other developments included within the programme will enhance the facilities at existing hospitals.
One subject that I have not yet addressed, but on which I receive the most correspondence, and have had the largest number of meetings over the past year, are my proposals for the reform of the structure of local government in Wales, to which my hon. Friend the Member for Delyn referred. I published my proposals for consultation last June, and am now considering the views expressed to me in response. The local authority associations discussed the results of an extensive programme of work commissioned by the Welsh Consultative Council on Local Government Finance, and I will reflect on the issues it raised before announcing a decision. That matter is of vital importance to everybody in Wales, and I shall inform the House of my conclusions in due course.
I am pleased to announce the Government's intentions concerning the promotion and safeguarding of the Welsh language. The past 12 years have seen a number of significant developments. In 1981, we established S4C. Its success is there for all to see. I am particularly pleased to note the indications that the S4C channel has become an important cultural force not only in Wales but increasingly further afield.
The past 10 years have also seen a further strengthening and consolidation of the place of Welsh in education. That culminated in the introduction of the Government's


proposals for Welsh in the national curriculum—widely recognised as the single most important measure taken by any Government in support of the language. The full effect of that policy will not become apparent for many years yet, but we made clear our commitment to giving every child in Wales the opportunity to become fluent in Welsh.
However crucial the role of schools, the language is not something that is or can be confined to the world of education. Over recent years, increasing attention has been paid to the position of the language in the community at large. Since being established by my right hon. Friend the Member for Worcester (Mr. Walker) in 1988, the Welsh Language Board has become an important force for change. It has done much to raise awareness and to improve the level of service provided for Welsh speakers.
Under its chairman, John Elfed Jones, the board has made a significant contribution in the period since it was established. I am pleased to tell the House that the Government have decided that the board should be placed on a statutory footing. I am confident that, in its new form, and with new powers, the board will be even better placed to undertake the difficult challenge that it will face in future.
The House will be aware that, last year, the Welsh Language Board made proposals for legislation in support of the language, which I considered carefully with my ministerial colleagues. The board's proposals were themselves the result of extensive consultation, and I pay tribute to those who were involved in the considerable task of preparing them.
At the heart of the board's proposals was the principle of equal validity and, in the public sector at least, granting Welsh equal status with English. That principle is one in which I believe. In drawing up the proposals that I will present to the House in due course, I have therefore sought to concentrate on the practical implications of that principle and the elimination of some of the difficulties with which Welsh speakers can be faced.
I am persuaded by the board's argument that the progress achieved so far can best be safeguarded by further legislative underpinning. The Government will therefore bring forward a Welsh language Bill. The legislation will include a duty on local authorities and other public agencies in Wales to draw up schemes defining the service that they provide for Welsh speakers. Those schemes will have to conform to criteria covering all aspects of dealing with the public. The new statutory Welsh Language Board will have the key role of agreeing those schemes. Once they are agreed, the board will have the further task of monitoring their implementation and investigating complaints.
I want to reassure the House that that does not mean that everybody within the public sector in Wales will need to become Welsh-speaking. We shall build on and develop what is already happening. A range of Government Departments and other public bodies in Wales have already shown that much can be achieved by the adoption of imaginative policies, the harnessing of existing staff, and the use of translation services. Neither is it my intention that every public body should rigidly adhere to exactly the same policy. Instead, it will be the board's task to assist in devising policies that reflect the very different situations facing the range of public authorities in Wales.
The schemes will need to reflect the different positions of the language in, for example, the south-east compared with the north and north-west. They will also need to

ensure that, in areas where Welsh speakers are in the majority, suitable provision is made for non-Welsh speakers.
For the first time, we will place consumers in a position where they will know what they can expect by way of Welsh language services from all the public organisations with which they deal. The board also made proposals concerning changes to the Welsh Language Act 1967, which I am minded to accept.

Mr. Alex Carlile: Will the Secretary of State's proposals include a right for children—if their parents wish it—to be educated in schools that teach exclusively through the medium of Welsh? Will it also include a right for children —if their parents wish it—to be taught in non-Welsh language schools where Welsh is available as a second language? That is an important issue in central Wales.

Mr. Hunt: I accept that. I refer the hon. and learned Gentleman to what the Minister of State has said about the whole question of Welsh-medium education. We need to provide every child in Wales with the opportunity to learn Welsh. However, I shall not stray too far down that road; if the hon. and learned Gentleman and others catch your eye, Mr. Deputy Speaker, they can make their own speeches on the issue, and my right hon. Friend the Minister of State will try to respond. I have been speaking for some 50 minutes, but I have not yet finished my speech.
Let me explain to the hon. Member for Caernarfon that one reason why it took me 12 months—only 12 months —to consider the proposals put to me by the Welsh Language Board is the fact that the Welsh Language Act 1967 contains a mistake, which we now propose to put right. Section 3 currently allows Ministers to determine that, in the case of a dispute, the English version of a text takes precedence over the Welsh version. I am aware that a number of people consider that that is tantamount to granting a lesser status to Welsh generally, and I am happy to announce that I have accepted the board's proposal for the repeal of the provision.
It is, of course, important to get the legislation right. I shall be introducing a new Welsh language Bill—or, at any rate, I very much hope that I shall—and it will then be for the House to judge the proposals that it contains.
The Government's most important contribution is their help in creating an environment in which people who want to speak Welsh are free, and able, to do so. The present Government have an impressive record of pursuing many ways of creating that environment over the past decade. Throughout that period, we have had a guiding principle: ultimately, the future of the language depends on the people who speak it. It would be counter-productive to do anything that would disturb the current good will towards the language among Welsh and non-Welsh speakers alike.

Mr. Wigley: I have been listening carefully to the Secretary of State's important statement, and I welcome the news that legislation is to be introduced. It is difficult, however, to respond to that news without knowing all the details. Can the right hon. Gentleman tell us whether he intends to incorporate all the Welsh Language Board's proposals in the draft legislation, rather than just picking out one or two of them? In particular, can he clarify the position of defendants who want their court cases to be heard in Welsh? Will jurors who understand Welsh be present so that the impact of evidence for the defence can be fully appreciated?

Mr. Hunt: Now that I have announced our intention to introduce a Welsh language Bill, I shall arrange an early meeting with the Welsh Language Board. I want to go through the board's proposals. I am not picking and choosing—although some of the proposals strike me as unnecessary, while others would affect the principle of the random selection of jurors, which is a key principle of British justice.
I ask the hon. Gentleman to await the legislation. I have carefully set out a number of extremely important points which I hope he will have an opportunity to ponder. If he and his colleagues wish to discuss the proposals with me in more detail, I shall be happy to meet them.
I am confident that our proposals will help to create an environment in which Welsh speakers can continue to exercise choice and to speak the Welsh language for many years. The Welsh Language Board has an important role to play in creating such an environment, as does every branch of the public sector in Wales. My proposals create a clear framework in which they can do so.
No doubt a number of hon. Members on both sides of the House will say that I have not dealt with the specific issues with which they wanted me to deal. I trust that my right hon. Friend the Minister of State will try to deal with some of them. I have been unable to address an enormous number of issues; if the House wished me to continue for another hour, no one would be more delighted than I, but I want to give others a chance to speak.
Let me conclude by saying that, despite a difficult economic background, this has been a good year for the people of Wales. They have experienced record inward investment; further commitment to the rights of the individual, under the citizens charter and other charters; and further developments in the integrated and partnership approach that has proved so successful in recent years. I believe that the Government have demonstrated their commitment to the people of Wales, and I am confident that the coming year will be as good a year as the past one. I am already looking forward to returning to this Dispatch Box in a year's time to report on it to the House.

Mr. Barry Jones: That really was an "I am delighted" speech—but the Secretary of State cannot talk to me about U-turns. Dai Poll Tax cannot give us any lectures; Dai Poll Tax will get his answer at the general election. My right hon. Friend the Member for IsIwyn (Mr. Kinnock) leads a united party, and that unity includes policy. On the occasion of the last Welsh debate before Labour takes power, let me reaffirm that Wales is a Labour nation.
At the beginning of his speech, the Secretary of State mentioned a host of past and current colleagues, expressing the feelings of us all. He also displayed his experience as a "usual channel". Certainly Wales has a good record in regard to inward investment, and we welcome the good news; but the Secretary of State must account for his stewardship.
In vain did we wait for an apology for the poll tax. The people of Wales are still listening attentively in the hope of hearing such an apology from the right hon. Gentleman. He made an important statement about the Welsh language, however—although I should have preferred him to make a statement proper; he now expects us to respond

to the details in the way in which he has given them. None the less, I welcome his commitment to introducing a Welsh language Bill, and his announcement of a statutory basis for the Welsh Language Board. Let me say, on behalf of the next Labour Government, that we will introduce a Bill: we will legislate speedily.
At long last, the Secretary of State has acknowledged the existence of a consensus throughout Wales, and, at the appropriate time, we shall consider the small print of what he has said. At no point in his speech, however, did we hear mention of practical measures to tackle the second great recession that we have endured under the present Government. At no point did we hear of a determination to halt the rising tide of redundancies; nor did we hear of a will to present new policies to end the disturbing rise in unemployment. We heard of no social or economic policy initiative to give hope to those who lack jobs, the homeless and the indebted.
I have here the Conservative party's manifesto for Wales for the 1987 general election. It was full of honeyed phrases and grandiloquent statements, but it was a false prospectus. It made no reference to opt-outs, recessions, redundancies, homelessness or hospital trusts. I remind the Secretary of State for Wales that NHS waiting lists in Wales are at record levels. Hospital beds in Wales have been cut by 2,800. There have been too many broken promises.
When the hon. Member for Cardiff, Central (Mr. Grist) was a Minister with responsibility for health he gave this pledge:
health authorities in Wales have been set a target to ensure that by March next year no patient should have to wait more than one month for urgent in-patient treatment, one year for non-urgent in-patient treatment and three months for a first-time out-patient appointment."—[Official Report, 6 July 1987; Vol. 119, c. 16.]
What happened? According to the House of Commons Library, since September 1987 the number of patients waiting for urgent in-patient treatment for more than one month has increased by 6 per cent., the number of patients waiting for non-urgent in-patient treatment for more than a year has increased by more than one third and the number of first-time out-patients waiting for more than three months has increased by 1 per cent. It is no wonder that when the Secretary of State published his patients charter he had to abandon the pledge made in the House in 1987 by his hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, Central.
One of my constituents wrote to me and said:
I am writing to tell you I had Hodgkins Disease in 1984, and was very sick with the chemotherapy and radium. It came back in 1987 and I was very, very sick again with the chemo again. In October 1991, imagine my horror when the doctor said it was back again, but it was called non-Hodgkins Disease. I told the doctors I could not go through this again. Dr.… said that there was a drug on the market called Kytril anti-sickness pill, made by Smith Kline Beecham. This is the tablet to stop you being sick. So I started my chemotherapy again—a course of twelve treatments. I had to have a tablet every second one but after two I could not have any more because the drug company is charging too much … they can only give to very ill patients. It's not the doctor or the nurses fault. They would like to give it to every patient. It really upsets the doctor and nurses knowing that this tablet is available … Could you please see if you can help us?
I have been a Member of Parliament for long enough to know that it is not wise to demand a specific answer from the Government. I do not have an answer for cases such as


that put to me by my constituent, who has suffered horribly and who cares enough about other people to write to me with her heartrending tale.
I want the Secretary of State, the Under-Secretary, the civil servants and hospital managers to concentrate 100 per cent. on relieving such misery and pain instead of running around Wales encouraging national health service managers to waste their time preparing bids to become opt-out hospitals. We know how hard it is to face up to specific cases. I do not demand that the Minister should respond today to this specific case.

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. Nicholas Bennett): The hon. Gentleman knows that I shall have investigated by the district health authority concerned any individual case that he cares to put to me. Has he been in touch with that person's doctor about the clinical diagnosis? If the hon. Gentleman will send me the details, I shall look into the case, along with the district general hospital and the district health authority. I ought to point out to the hon. Gentleman, however, that since the Conservatives came to power spending on the national health service has increased, in real terms, by 62 per cent., compared with the 9 per cent. increase during the five years in which the hon. Gentleman had ministerial responsibility for health matters.

Mr. Jones: The Under-Secretary is the very man who is going round Wales urging hospitals to opt out. He is putting pressure on hospital administrators, but we want him to tackle the real problems that face the national health service in Wales.
The Government have spent the last 13 years undermining local democracy and eroding the quality of local services in Wales. There is no worse example of the Conservative party's arrogance, unfairness and disdain for public opinion than the poll tax. I remind the Secretary of State that more than £100 million has been wasted on its introduction and that more than 400,000 summonses have been issued in Wales. That is the cost of the Tory poll tax.
The Secretary of State may shuffle and squirm but he must listen and then consider apologising for the poll tax to the people of Wales. He has given quotations; I shall give one to him. At the 1989 Conservative party conference he said:
The fact is that, whatever Labour claim or do, the community charge is on course for successful introduction throughout England and Wales next year.
That might wow the blue rinses at Blackpool, but it will not help the Conservatives in Wales. What we seek from the right hon. Gentleman is an apology for the poll tax.

Sir Anthony Meyer: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Jones: No. There is very real pressure on time in this debate. The Secretary of State for Wales spoke for almost an hour.
We demand an apology from the Secretary of State. He owes an apology for the poll tax to the people of Wales.
Ministers wish to evade the Government's record on the economy. Unemployment is now four fifths higher than it was in 1979. The number of employees in manufacturing industries in Wales has fallen by almost a third. There are now, astonishingly, 94,000 fewer manufacturing jobs in Wales than there were when the

Conservatives took office. There is no better illustration of the Government's erosion of our manufacturing base than Wales.
Recorded crime has doubled and criminal damage has increased by 185 per cent. Nevertheless, there has been one blazing success, one superb achievement by Welsh Office Ministers: they have managed to increase Welsh Office advertising and publicity spending by 2,253 per cent. I recollect that in a debate in the Chamber in 1990 the right hon. Member for Worcester (Mr. Walker) referred to a remarkable transformation of the unemployment scene. He can say that again. In last year's Welsh affairs debate the right hon. Member for Conwy (Sir W. Roberts) said—it was a very bold thing to say—that
things are going to get better and not worse.
In the same debate the Secretary of State said:
the Welsh economy is extremely healthy".—[Official Report, 28 February 1991; Vol. 186, c. 1149–207.]
What has happened? Mortgage repossessions have increased by 4,000 in the past year. There are 35,000 people who have been out of work for more than a year —three in 10 of the unemployed. This year already there have been 2,500 job losses and I understand that 1,600 workers are to be laid off at Hotpoint in March. That is not a million miles from the seat of the Minister of State.
The list of job losses is worrying. It is like a "Who's Who" of Welsh business. There have been job losses at Ford in Bridgend and Swansea, Royal Worcester, South Wales Electricity, National Power, Dunlopillo, Howells, British Steel at Shotton and Port Talbot and Ferodo in Caernarfon. There have been 250 job losses at Dennis Ferranti at Bangor, the Brymbo steelworks has been closed and there have been job losses at Lucas in Gwent, British Aerospace in Clwyd, Hoover and Thorn in Merthyr Tydfil and AB Electronics in Pontypridd. As well as the job losses at those great companies there have been many pit closures. The pits that have been closed include Mardy, Blaenant, Deep Navigation, Penallta, Cynheidre, Marine, Merthyr Vale and Oakdale. Those redundancies are building up in areas of Wales where unemployment is at its worst already.
The Secretary of State did not want to deal with those issues. He set up diversions and tried to concentrate on issues a long way from unemployment and the state of the economy. Since the right hon. Member for Wirral, West (Mr. Hunt) became Secretary of State, unemployment has risen by 50 per cent.—a staggering 40,000 increase. That amounts to 2,000 for every month that he has been in the Welsh Office. The Secretary of State has lost highly skilled Marconi jobs in his constituency. Many members of that work force live in my constituency.
Unemployment in the Pembroke area is nearly 90 per cent. higher than when the Conservatives took office. The Under-Secretary of State, the hon. Member for Pembroke (Mr. Bennett), has been watched closely by his constituents. Has he really fought his corner? We are far from convinced that he has.
Unemployment in Mid Glamorgan has increased by more than half compared to 1979. In the past year alone, unemployment in Brecon and Radnor has increased by 36 per cent. Unemployment has gone up in the Vale of Glamorgan by a quarter and in Monmouth by nearly a third.
It seems that Cardiff has become the unemployment capital of Wales. More than 20,000 people are


unemployed. In the Cardiff area, unemployment is 50 per cent. higher than when the Conservatives took office. The situation in Cardiff, Central is appalling.
The glib comments by the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the complacent comments by the Secretary of State will not get Wales out of recession. Sir Peter Phillips of the Confederation of British Industry in Wales recently said:
What we now need is a spark to recovery".
We will not get that from the Chancellor or the Secretary of State. In the face of the most severe United Kingdom recession in the past 60 years, the Government are paralysed by their failures. They have no strategy and do not know what to do. The Secretary of State's speech today gave no answers. There was no will to succeed and no policy. Wales has had enough of struggling out of the pit of one recession, only to be knocked back down again by the next. The Secretary of State must take that on board.
As the Government near their end, is not this a lamentable record? After all the propaganda, press releases, oil revenues, privatisation revenues and two savage recessions, what does Wales have? Wales has high and rising unemployment. Every week this year it has experienced blue chip companies making redundancies. This is a Government of failure and indecision. For those reasons, I predict that Welsh Office Ministers and their Back-Bench Members will lose their seats and a Labour Government will be swept into power.

Mr. Ian Grist: The hon. Member for Alyn and Deeside (Mr. Jones) made some glib predictions. Unemployment in my constituency was higher at the time of our triumph in 1987 than it is now. He might like to bear that in mind.
I made my maiden speech in the St. David's day debate in 1974, when three right hon. Members and one hon. Member from the Labour party were present and two Conservative Members were present. That Parliament ushered in a most extraordinary Government. The right hon. Member for Llanelli (Mr. Davies) was eventually, and rightly, taken on as a Minister of State at the Treasury when real monetarism was brought into play. He would be the first to tell us that under the International Monetary Fund we went through the most unpleasant period of economic restraint. The right hon. and learned Member for Aberavon (Mr. Morris) had to withdraw programmes right and left, whether on housing or health, the number of people treated as out-patients fell and the Government were split over whether we should remain a member of the European Community. The Cabinet was so badly split that we had to have a referendum. The right hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent (Mr. Foot) was on one side of the argument and the right hon. and learned Member for Aberavon on the other.
The Conservative argument won hands down on that occasion, as it did in the St. David's day referendum on devolution. The Labour Government were kept in office by the Liberals and the nationalists because of that argument, and when it failed the Government failed: the two matters were intimately linked. The Labour party should remember that. The current Leader of the Opposition, then the hon. Member for Bedwellty, in

answer to a claim by Mr. Cledwyn Hughes that the arguments on devolution had been well ventilated, said that the idea had been shot as full of holes as a colander. That was one of the better cracks that he made on the issue.
That was a miserable Parliament. Labour left office after the winter of discontent, when there was darkness, unburied bodies and surgical operations refused, all because of trade union abuse of power. One of the great changes that we have introduced is to free people from the domination and bullying perpetrated by the allies and creators of the Labour party.
Unfortunately, we still suffer from some of the attitudes which were born in the 1960s and earlier but are responsible for some of the problems today. I refer to the attitudes, which I espouse, to relaxing the sexual and social traumas of the past, freeing people and leaving them to make their own decisions. Unfortunately, that has often been taken as a form of licence. We have seen the breakdown of family life, the abuse that has resulted from that, and the traumas and difficulties of young people having to deal with step-parents, and so on. That has led, ultimately, to a growth in illegitimacy, which is a problem in my constituency—other hon. Members will be aware of this—with many young girls coming in from the valleys and elsewhere, giving rise to housing problems. The growth in homelessness is based largely on people not being able to keep their tempers. Such breakdowns in family life can be traced back to the change in social attitudes in the late 1950s and 1960s and on into the 1970s. We are paying a heavy penalty for that.
In most respects, Wales has flourished. The physical appearance of the country alone tells us much. The streets, villages and town centres of Labour Members' constituencies have benefited from the urban programme and the enveloping of streets. I have had more enveloping in my constituency than any other in Wales. We have seen the renewal of the physical fabric, with the grassing over of enormous derelict areas by the Welsh Development Agency, which has conducted the largest programme in Europe. We are greening Wales again, making it an attractive place, and the garden festival is the most visible symbol of that. That has been one of the Conservative Government's greatest achievements.
The education achievements of the people of Wales, which we debated in the Welsh Grand Committee, have improved. There has been a remarkable increase in training. Employment, to which the Secretary of State referred in his speech, is now varied rather than our being trapped in two or three major declining old industries. I should have thought that everyone would welcome that.
New roads, which were cut when the Labour Government had to go to the IMF, have been constructed. I bitterly remember the dual carriageway to Merthyr Tydfil coming to an abrupt halt at Taffs Well—another project which foundered on the rocks of the overspending espoused by the Labour party in 1974–75. [HON. MEMBERS: "Nonsense."] If Labour Members contest that, the book of their former Chief Secretary is a good read: the facts are clearly laid out there.
Tremendous improvements have been made in the NHS. The hon. Member for Alyn and Deeside ignores the fact that fewer out-patients were treated when he was the Minister. Under the Conservative Government, outpatient treatment has risen by a third, in-patient treatment by more than 40 per cent., and day case treatment by


about 150 per cent. There has been expansion in the number of doctors, consultants, nurses and therapists. New hospitals have been constructed throughout Wales. Labour Members should use their eyes if they believe otherwise. We are now able to perform more hip, knee and eye operations.
The Labour party is trying to ride the Western Mail programme for devolution. That is not surprising because it is a media-run campaign. It is one of those subjects which, if raised with ordinary electors, never features. They are concerned about mortgages, jobs, the price of food and education, but devolution never arises. It is only when they are specifically asked and guided that devolution emerges, as it did in the 1970s. I am amazed that Labour Members advance such a policy, especially the hon. Member for Alyn and Deeside who as Minister in charge of the policy at the time received a slap in the face from his constituents and from constituents throughout Wales. They knew that it was nonsense and that any form of serious devolution would mean, as the Liberal pamphlet rightly says, the end of the Welsh Office and the Secretary of State. But that might be a small price to pay compared with losing the voice of Wales in the Cabinet of the United Kingdom. The rights of Members of Parliament from Wales would be cut, because we should not be able to vote on issues affecting England and Scotland. We would have to be imperial Members of Parliament, voting on the big issues, but not on those affecting our constituents because they would be left with the Welsh assembly.
English Members of Parliament would not be happy because they would have to vote moneys to be spent by other elected bodies over which they had no say—unless, of course, we were to follow the logical path of having an assembly which raised its own funds, which the Labour party has never dared to suggest because it knows what it would mean and the answer that it would receive from constituents.
That is the underlying weakness of the talks about devolution. The Labour party should come clean by explaining to people the real repercussions of going down that path. I am sure that people do not believe in it any more than I do. The nationalists use devolution merely as a means of getting an independent Wales.

The Minister of State, Welsh Office (Sir Wyn Roberts): Is my hon. Friend aware of the report in The Daily Telegraph that the right hon. and learned Member for Monklands, East (Mr. Smith) has said that an assembly could cause income tax to vary by as much as 2p either way in Scotland and Wales?

Mr. Grist: I had not seen that report, but the right hon. and learned Member for Monklands, East (Mr. Smith) arrives at an odd conclusion. I am not sure how he arrives at that figure of 2p in the pound. If a Welsh assembly had to raise its own funds, Welsh income tax would rise by much more than 2p. We might get back to 35p in the pound, which we had under the Labour party, and perhaps 98p on savings. I believe that Labour Members want to increase the tax on savings and return to the merry old days of the last Labour Government.
I wish that the Labour party would make clear its attitude to the Cardiff bay proposals. The barrage will put the final touches to the redevelopment of south Cardiff and to the whole city. It will transform Cardiff into one of the greatest cities in Europe. More than any action taken by

the Government, it will cause the spotlight of fame to fall on south Wales. People will be drawn to south Wales to see the changes to the valleys, to see our good communications and to see the waterfront at Swansea and other places where great transformations have taken place. As yet, the Labour party has said nothing about whether it will continue the policy that we have espoused.

Mr. Gareth Wardell: I want to concentrate on housing, which did not play a prominent part in the Secretary of State's speech. Indeed, he spent most of the time—certainly the first quarter of an hour—discussing a subject that has not burnt in the breasts of the people of Gower since I have been in the House. Indeed, I cannot remember receiving one letter or telephone call about devolution. I should be interested to know how much correspondence other hon. Members have received on the subject. Perhaps I have completely missed what my constituents are concerned about, but so far as I am able to glean it is not devolution.
I wish to consider two documents which constitute a savage indictment of the Government's paralysis and complacency on the housing needs of the Welsh people. The first is a letter to me from Swansea city council, dated 10 February, informing me that the only single persons or childless couples who can be considered for a one or two-bedroom flat are current council house tenants requesting transfers. In other words, the city of Swansea has, in effect, closed its housing list to all except those who would be at risk on medical and social grounds and who could qualify for one offer of housing under the Housing Act 1985. The letter is in reply to a young couple's case of a type with which we are all too familiar.
When Mr. and Mrs. Thomas first planned their wedding, they put their names on the council waiting list. They were prepared for a wait, but when Mr. Thomas was offered a different local job with a tied cottage, he took it. They had a home of their own in which to start their married life, but they remained on the council list. That was five years ago. Mr. Thomas was made redundant and the couple were therefore made homeless. The council could not help and, in desperation, the couple put their furniture in relatives' sheds and spare rooms and moved in with Mr. Thomas's parents.
As Mrs. Thomas wrote to me, it was not that her parents-in-law were not nice, kind and understanding, but they had retired; they thought that they were free of parenthood and they wanted their house to themselves. Mr. and Mrs. Thomas both work but could never hope to buy a house on the Gower peninsula, where they were born and where they lived and worked. They have postponed having a family because they want a home first so as to provide a proper environment for their children's upbringing.
As Mrs. Thomas said, if they had acted irresponsibly and had had the two children they planned, they would be high on the council list. As it is, they have seen families who are considered to be a higher priority take the few houses and flats that have become vacant over the years. Mr. and Mrs. Thomas are typical of thousands of couples in Wales.
The Secretary of State's claims about increased prosperity in Wales are not borne out by any measure one cares to use. The reality for couples such as Mr. and Mrs.


Thomas is entirely different. Gross domestic product per head in Wales is 28 per cent. lower than in the south-east of England. We have the lowest GDP per head of any region in Britain. When the Government came to power, pay levels for men and women workers in Wales were virtually the same as in England, but 13 years later Welsh male manual workers are the lowest paid in Britain and average male earnings overall in Wales have fallen by 8 per cent. compared with earnings in England. Similarly, female Welsh workers have gone from being the second highest paid in Britain to last but one in the pay league. Whichever way pay in Wales is analysed—by industrial sector, occupation or area—pay levels in comparison with England are extremely low and have become much worse during the 13 years of the Government's regime, leaving Wales firmly at the bottom of the British pay league.
Mr. and Mrs. Thomas's joint pay is less than £180 per week. In 1990, 60 per cent. of council tenants in south Wales had a gross household income of less than £80 per week and 92 per cent. had less than £150 a week.

Mr. Huw Edwards: As my hon. Friend said, Wales is the low pay region in Great Britain. I am sure that he will wish to condemn the Government's recent proposals to abolish wages councils, which fix minimum wages for one in eight workers in Wales in some of our biggest sectors such as retailing and catering. It is a scandalous proposal which shows that the Government are prepared to try to reduce unemployment by driving low wages even lower.

Mr. Wardell: I am grateful for that very helpful intervention. It reminds me very much of the argument used by the Victorian economist Nassau Senior who said that industrialists should drive down wages in order to increase profits. Fortunately, since then, more erudite and sensible economists have seen the great advantages in an economy of high wages. High wages frequently bring high productivity because people on low wages with a low standard of living are often unable to produce the goods and services necessary to bring us into the early years of the next century.
As unemployment levels have climbed to almost 10 per cent., poverty will grind down more families in Wales. The Government's mismanagement of the economy and their belated attempt to control a credit free-for-all created a price explosion in housing which caused 190,000 home owners to be dispossessed of their homes last year. Swansea city council's efforts to rehouse its share of those desperate families have finally nailed the hopes of couples such as Mr. and Mrs. Thomas for council housing in their home areas.
Despite lower average wage levels, widespread poverty and the number of house repossessions—all of which impress and reinforce the case for an increase in social, public and low-cost housing to rent—the Government refuse to recognise the problems facing thousands of Welsh couples and families. On the contrary, the Government regard their housing policy as a success because the number of people in Wales who own their own homes has increased from 62 per cent. in 1981 to 71 per cent. in 1990.
That is the background against which there has been a massive loss of public housing, which is still running at

over 7,500 per year. Between March 1980 and March 1990, almost 90,000 homes in Wales were sold under the right-to-buy scheme. Funding for Welsh housing associations will allow only 3,500 new homes to be built this year. That represents an estimated annual shortfall of about 4,000 homes and does not take into account the 3,151 couples and families facing repossession orders in the Wales and Chester area courts.
I said that there was a second document that I wished to mention. It involves the advice that the Select Committee on Welsh Affairs, which I am pleased to chair, received on 21 January this year about the Government's response to our report on housing in Wales. I wish to register my great disappointment with the Government's response, and I shall give three examples to illustrate some of the reasons for that disappointment.
As the Secretary of State said, I am sure that the Minister of State is taking copious notes and examining the document that he and his Department produced. Recommendation 10 refers to a review which we recommended that the Welsh Office carry out of the Local Government and Housing Act 1989, to enable local authorities to establish trusts similar to the Winchester housing trust in England, which the Committee visited during its deliberations.
The Welsh Office response made the adviser and me wonder whether the Minister had read our report at all. We wondered, too, whether even the officials had read the report—certainly the Welsh Office response to that recommendation leaves a great deal to be desired. I hope that the Minister will read the relevant section of the report again and accept that what is good enough for Winchester is good enough for Wales.
It is not acceptable that, although the Government are prepared for English local authorities to take advantage of certain schemes, the Welsh Office is unhappy about Wales having the same facilities.

Mr. Keith Raffan: Does the hon. Gentleman—I almost called him my hon. Friend, which he certainly was in the Select Committee—agree thatmes what he has said about the Government's response to the Select Committee report simply emphasises the urgent need for Select Committee reports to be fully debated, and for the Government to be brought at least to the Welsh Grand Committee, if not to the Floor of the House—or, indeed, the floor of an assembly—to answer fully for their responses to Select Committee reports?

Mr. Wardell: I am grateful to the hon. Member for Delyn (Mr. Raffan), who has been a good ally in the work that we have done together in the Select Committee. I know that he will share my feelings, and those of other members of the Committee, about the great debates that we have had. On very few occasions did we manage to introduce such debates on the Floor of the House. In fact, I can think of only one such occasion—the debate on the Towyn floods. That debate had the great advantage of allowing us to show the people of Wales that we are extremely concerned when such events take place, but it illustrates what the hon. Member for Delyn said—that it takes an event such as the Towyn flood, and a Select Committee report on it, to bring about such a debate. I fully accept the hon. Gentleman's point, and I hope that the Government will move in the direction that he suggests.
In response to recommendation 9, the Welsh Office provides no justification for the fact that existing housing associations cannot do what trusts can do. I hope that the Government will reconsider that, and the evidence that we provided, which clearly shows that the Winchester housing trust can do things that Tai Cymru and the housing associations cannot do. I hope that the Minister replying to the debate will deal with that matter.
Recommendations 11 and 12 of the Select Committee report reflect the Committee's great anxiety about the continuing lax planning in Wales, but the Government's response shows that they do not share that anxiety. The Committee was so dissatisfied with the lack of Welsh Office monitoring of planning that we decided to send out to the chief planning officer of every district council in Wales a detailed questionnaire so as to establish a district-bydistrict index of lax planning.
The Welsh Select Committee has to do what the Welsh Office refuses to do. Unless it is done, there will be a continuation—even, perhaps, an increase—of what the Committee described in recommendation 12 of its report. We said that as
councillors"—
we meant district councillors in particular—
have suggested that developments should be permitted anywhere, it is extremely likely that there will be residual hope value near village settlements in many parts of Wales and land will not be offered at a very low price for local people.
It is a fundamental truth that the Welsh Office must begin to monitor closely what district councils throughout Wales are doing—they often flout their local plans, and the Welsh Office refuses to become involved. Indeed, I feel that the argument about a Welsh assembly misses the point about unitary authorities. The question is this: when authorities are merged, who will monitor the difference between local authorities with no local plans and those subject to county structure plans?
Recommendation 18 suggested that the Welsh Office establish and fund a Welsh rural housing trust, but the Welsh Office disagreed. The Secretary of State for the Environment is a Welshman. Indeed, he contested Gower in 1959, when his opponent was my predecessor. The right hon. Gentleman did not do too well then, but he has gone on to higher things since—or so I am told. The Secretary of State for the Environment wants England to continue with its own rural trusts. He does not want England to be subject to circular 30/86, which gives rich people almost a right to come into Wales and obtain planning permission to build houses in the open countryside. Such a right does not exist in England—only the Welsh have to put up with it.
That is another example of the fact that although the Secretary of State for the Environment, who says what can happen in England, allows rural housing trusts, which are making great, and successful, attempts to build affordable housing for young people, the Secretary of State for Wales is not prepared to give the Welsh the same facilities as the people of England. That is not fair. The Government obviously do not consider that what is good enough for England is good enough for Wales to have on the same basis.
Rural housing trusts are the sort of schemes for which small rural Welsh communities are desperate, but the Secretary of State has turned a deaf ear. Perhaps Tai Cymru has succeeded in bending his ear, and as a result has succeeded in preventing the initiative from coming

through. To turn a deaf ear is the Secretary of State's privilege and the people of Wales's loss. But the time has now almost come—it will come next week, or the week after—when the people of Wales will turn a deaf ear to the Minister's claims that the Government have met Welsh housing needs. That will be the Minister's loss. He and his party will be voted out on their ear on 9 April.

Sir Anthony Meyer: It is a privilege to follow the hon. Member for Gower (Mr. Wardell), who has been the Chairman of the Welsh Select Committee throughout this Parliament. He has carried out his duties to the unqualified admiration of all Members of the Committee, and has shown an extraordinary assiduity in research and in marshalling facts. However, on this occasion I thought that some of the facts that he marshalled were excessively assiduous and a bit selective.
I agree with the hon. Gentleman how important it is that the hard work done by the Select Committee should be taken seriously by the Welsh Office, and that it should not be fobbed off with what could be described as pretty glib responses. I hope that what the hon. Gentleman has said will have struck home.
I am only too conscious that 12 months ago I said that I was making my last speech in a Welsh debate in this place. This time it really is the last time, and I promise not to do a Mr. Chips act. I shall look back over 13 years of Tory government in Wales and try to draw up a balance sheet from a standpoint slightly more detached than other hon. Members may be able to afford on the eve of a general election.
I will certainly not step so far out of character as to claim that everything that we have done has been good; nor will I claim that everything that the previous Labour Government did achieved nothing at all—or that the policies which Labour now advances are entirely misguided. I have never believed that my lot were 100 per cent. right and the other lot 100 per cent. wrong. Still less do I doubt the sincerity and good intentions of the Labour party, although I must remind the House that the road to hell is paved with good intentions.
What is more, I am ready to concede that the achievements of the past 13 years—the huge rise in personal living standards, the dramatic increase in home ownership, the modernisation of the Welsh economy—have been bought at a price. It has been a cruelly high price for thousands who have lost their jobs or who are now on short time, and for many hundreds of businesses and firms built up by a lifetime of hard work and thrift, which have been swept away, first by the harsh processes of industrial reconversion and then in the recession.
Society—for the avoidance of doubt, there is such a thing—carries an inescapable responsibility to the victims of change. I am hugely relieved that the Government, whom I am proud now to support, have not hesitated to acknowledge that responsibility. What is more, I have a horrible feeling that, although we may reasonably expect a revival of small businesses, the numbers of unemployed will not fall even when we move out of the recession.
In the past, experts always told us that technological change did not product lasting unemployment: new jobs


came along to replace the old ones. I am not sure that that is now true. Until now, we have been thinking in terms of white-collar jobs replacing manual jobs, but it is precisely in the office that the information technology revolution will bring the largest job losses. These changes have portentous consequences for the future of our society. I do not believe that any Government in any country or any political party in this country has any kind of an answer, nor do I believe that academic thinkers are much help in trying to find one.
Having planted those seeds of doubt—they are indeed dragons' teeth—let me now continue my retrospective. What would have happened if Labour had been in power these past 13 years? I do not go as far as to say that all the coal mines and all the steel works operating in 1979 would be operating today. Labour closed a large number of coal mines during its period of office, but it is certain that a Labour Government would have put off and put off the decisions, as they did with the closure of steelmaking at Shotton. It was left to their Conservative successors in 1979 to take those tough and unpopular closure decisions.
When I arrived in north Wales in 1970, the whole area was frighteningly dependent on steel and coal. The Labour Government had consistently refused to face up to the problems that arose from overcapacity in steel and from the wrong siting of some Welsh steel works. They refused to face the consequences of the growing exhaustion of accessible coal seams in Wales, and, more damagingly still, they tamely acquiesced in the refusal of the Scargill-led National Union of Mineworkers to contemplate working methods which might have given a reprieve to some coal mines and which would, still more, have enabled other more profitable pits to be opened up.
In this as in other industries, Labour's record in opposition has been one of fighting to the death to preserve the sunset industries and the jobs that go with them. That is not necessarily an ignoble strategy, but it is one that would have hindered the emergence of the far healthier mixed industrial economy which can be seen today in Deeside, Wrexham, all around Cardiff, Newport and Swansea.
Whatever the solution to structural unemployment may be, one thing is quite certain: only a wealth-creating economy can possibly provide the necessary conditions for that solution, and that wealth-creating economy cannot be sustained by obsolescent industry. Any hon. Member who doubts that should go to eastern Europe and look.
Then there is the other huge consideration of Labour policy towards the European Community. I am delighted that the Labour party has now recognised this new elephant sitting on its doorstep, to use the picturesque phrase of the right hon. and learned Member for Aberavon (Mr. Morris), but there is no getting away from the fact that, if Labour had won the election of 1983 under the leadership of the right hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent (Mr. Foot) or that of 1987 under the right hon. Member for Islwyn (Mr. Kinnock), Britain would now be outside the European Community—and once out we could not have got in again except on our knees.
What then would have happened to all the inward investment which not only provides so many tens of thousands of jobs but which has done so much to raise standards of management in Wales? The old xenophobic

prejudices still lurk below the surface of the Labour party—I can almost sense the presence of the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) in his seat. Perhaps a future Labour Government would no longer threaten to take Britain out of the European Community, but potential inward investors would not feel the same comfortable certainty that investment in Wales guaranteed open access to the whole single market of the European Community.
It is all very well for Liberal Democrats to promise just about everything to everybody—or rather, everything that the opinion polls show people want—because they will never have to deliver, but it is disturbing to see how far the Labour party is going in the direction of finger-in-the-wind politics.
To take a trivial but revealing instance, opinion polls show that the abolition of fox hunting would be a vote winner. Personally, I think that hunting and killing animals for pleasure is a nasty business and that some so-called sports, such as hare coursing, constitute real unjustifiable cruelty and should be outlawed forthwith. I cannot be persuaded, however, that hunting foxes with hounds is a crueller way of killing an extremely cruel predator than shooting, which as often as not leaves a wounded animal to crawl away to a slow and painful death.
But that is not the point. The point is that the Labour party, which as a party has never shown that animal welfare is right at the top of its priorities, has suddenly scented a possible electoral quarry. By preventing a minority from enjoying something that they very much enjoy doing, the Labour party hopes to win votes from the majority, guided thereto by obliging opinion polls. I find that pretty squalid.
Then there is education. It was a Labour Secretary of State, Mrs. Shirley Williams, who gave us comprehensive education, and a mixed blessing it has turned out to be. Of course there are some excellent comprehensive schools—I have some outstanding ones in my constituency—but variety of educational provision is worth preserving. It is not to be lightly cast aside—all the less so when there is so little of it left.
Labour's pledge to abolish the remaining direct grant schools and to bleed the independent schools to death by abolishing the assisted places scheme may satisfy the envious instincts of an electoral majority, but the money saved by abolishing the assisted places scheme will have no discernible effect on total provision for maintained schools. It will do nothing to improve standards of education, which benefit immensely from what little choice and competition has been left by the rush to mass comprehensivisation.
What would a Labour Government have meant—what would a Labour Government mean—for the health service? It would have meant quite simply a refusal to accept the changes—necessary, even if they were at first unpopular—that would enable the national health service to survive the pressure of ever-mounting demands created by its own success. I am glad to say that the Labour party has picked a loser, and that serves Labour right. The Government have stuck to their guns over hospital trusts and budget-holding practices. There is increasing evidence that the changes are working well and are popular.
Finally, we must consider devolution, which we may or may not be debating in the Welsh Grand Committee in Cardiff, depending on whether the Labour party has the stomach for it. As those hon. Members who are members


of Plaid Cymru and the Liberal Democrats are aware, my views on devolution are not far removed from theirs. I am quite happy with the idea of an independent Wales as a full member of the European Community on fully federal lines with strict regard for the principles of subsidiarity—but eventually. I do not believe that the time for such a radical change has come, and it probably will not come this decade.
I am reminded of the former French Prime Minister, Mr. Rocard, who went to see my right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher) when she was Prime Minister. When he emerged, he said that he was glad to say that his views and hers on European integration were virtually identical. He had asked her when she thought that there would be a united states of Europe, and she had said, not in 1,000 years. Mr. Rocard said that there would be one within five years. He then said, "As you can see, the difference is merely one of timing."
Whatever the opinion polls may say, I remain totally unconvinced that public opinion in Wales is really ready yet to pay the price of devolution. That price involves inevitably higher taxes of one sort or another, not just to run the assembly. If there is to be an assembly, it must have revenue-raising powers. There is a price also in terms of disincentives to inward investors, who may fear that devolution might impose new burdens and fresh complications on them. Above all, there is a price in terms of the loss, or at the very best the downgrading, of the Secretary of State for Wales, who, in this Conservative Government, has been such an outstanding success in getting for Wales far more than its due share of inward investment and central Government funds—for example, by way of revenue support grant.
Until I am satisfied that the people of Wales regard an elected assembly as something more than a status symbol, I shall support the cautious approach of the Secretary of State and his advisory council. In this, as in so many other matters, I have great faith in the judgment of my right hon. Friend. He has shown a quite extraordinary sensitivity to Welsh feelings and aspirations, and a startling ability to fight his corner for Wales in the Cabinet. I can hardly suppose that he will remain in his job after the election: he is clearly destined for higher things. [HON. MEMBERS: "What about Scotland?"] That might be a good idea. My right hon. Friend will be a very hard act to follow, perhaps even harder than his predecessor. I believe that, in their secret hearts, all hon. Members, in all parties, wish him well.

Several Hon. Members: rose——

Madam Deputy Speaker (Miss Betty Boothroyd): I remind the House that we are now in the period in which the Standing Order applies.

Mr. Richard Livsey: It is a real pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Clwyd, North-West (Sir A. Meyer). He has not lost his diplomat's statistical panache, as was clear when he referred to the French, and we will miss him greatly when he leaves this place. I do not entirely agree with what he said about some of the things that the Welsh Office has been up to, but there are two sides to the House and we hold different views about such things.
I thank the Secretary of State for his announcement about the Welsh language Bill. That Bill is long overdue, and I wonder why the Minister of State did not contrive to introduce such a Bill earlier in this Parliament. However, I hope that it will become an Act soon. At least all four parties in Wales now have a commitment to a Welsh language Act in their manifestos for the general election, and that is how it should be.
The tone of the Secretary of State's speech was one of impartial self-congratulation. When we analyse cruelly what has happened in Wales over the past 12 months or so, we should consider the matter more analytically than was the case in the public relations exercise conducted by the Secretary of State.
The Chairman of the Select Committee on Welsh Affairs, the hon. Member for Gower (Mr. Wardell), was right to highlight the problem of housing in Wales. In a reply to a parliamentary question that I asked within the past 10 days, it has emerged that about 3,500 council houses were completed in Wales in 1979. It also emerged that only 380 council houses were completed in 1991. It is all very well for Ministers to claim that 3,500 houses are being completed through Tai Cymru—Housing for Wales but many of those houses are unaffordable. Council houses are at least affordable in terms of average Welsh earnings, which, as we have already heard, are the lowest in the mainland United Kingdom. However, the rents of many housing association houses are unaffordable. Such rents are often between £45 and £50 a week, and they can comprise 40 per cent. of the incomes of people working in relatively low-paid jobs in Wales.
I am sad to say that some housing association houses in my constituency are unoccupied because local people cannot afford the rents. That shows that housing association grants are not generous enough. I hope that the Minister will accept that those housing association houses need more generous housing association grants so that the people of Wales can afford to live in them.
Within the past week, I asked a parliamentary question about homelessness in Wales. I was told that 14,402 people were classified as homeless in Wales in 1987. However, by 1991, there were 23,694. That is an increase of 9,000 within the past four years. That is unacceptable. Indeed, an additional 3,000 people came on to the homeless list in 1991.
I feel particularly strongly about unemployment. It seems to have returned to the state that it was in the 1930s, when my father was unemployed for four years. He was born and brought up in Brecon, but left to travel the seas of the world as a master mariner. The only job he could find in the 1930s was as captain of a dredger in the Gulf. Within six months of obtaining that job, he was dead. My mother lost my father when I was three. She had to return to work, and we had a very tough time.
The barren policies of the 1930s have returned. People cannot find work. There are 128,000 people out of work in Wales today—an increase of 27,000 since the start of 1991. That is not a record of which to be proud. One third of the unemployed are aged between 18 and 25. That is astounding. What future do the young people of Wales have when 43,000 of them are out of work? We must all be concerned about that, no matter which political party we represent in the House.
The situation in the countryside is not good. Farm incomes, in real terms, are at their lowest levels since the second world war. There has been a minor rally in the past


12 months—an increase of 15 per cent.—but in the previous year we saw drops of 21 per cent. in dairy farming incomes and 25 per cent. in hill farming incomes. Many farms are going bankrupt. We cannot accept that.
In the United Kingdom, 1,000 agricultural jobs are being shed every month. Fifty farmers a week leave the land. That has been happening since 1980. We know from research carried out at the university in Aberystwyth that 15,000 people in Wales are expected to leave the land in the next five years. That is not satisfactory. I wonder whether the Government have an adequate agricultural policy to tackle those problems. Also, 4,112 businesses in Wales have gone into receivership in the past 12 months and 2,000 people have become bankrupt. That is a 92 per cent. increase over the previous year. Mortgage repossessions have already been mentioned.
There is tremendous pressure for an announcement before the election on the reorganisation of local government in Wales. I counsel the Government to take a longer and harder look at that matter, whatever the colour of the Government after the general election. Such a decision cannot be taken rapidly. I cannot understand why there is no independent commission to make recommendations to the Government of the day, based on an objective assessment of the needs of local government in Wales. If we are to have unitary authorities, they should be allied to a Welsh assembly. To have unitary authorities without a Welsh assembly does not add up to a logical policy.
The danger is that we could have many small unitary authorities being exploited by the Government of the day because they will not be strong, whereas, if there were a Welsh assembly, we could have a proper structure and a proper strategic body which could democratically allocate and sort out priorities. In local government, we need democracy and we need accountability from democracy. The cost implications also must be taken into account.
We in Wales live in a wonderful country. The people are friendly—probably the most friendly people in the United Kingdom. They have wit, humour, imagination and inventiveness in the workplace.
I congratulate the Secretary of State and the Welsh Office on setting up in Brussels an office for Wales in the past week. That was long overdue, but it shows the way that Wales is going in its relationships with the European Community. Wales will become more important in those relationships. We need to look with imagination to the future for Wales. I believe that it is optimistic if the people are given the reins of more power to exercise their undoubted abilities.

Mr. John P. Smith: I take this opportunity to bring to the attention of all Welsh Members a problem that has arisen recently and affects us all. It relates to one of the long-standing Welsh economic success stories—the banana trade between Wales and the eastern Caribbean islands, the Windward islands. I have spoken on the subject on a number of occasions. Until recently, we thought that we had achieved considerable success in persuading the Government that certain steps should be taken to secure preferential access for Afro-Caribbean and Pacific bananas into not only the

United Kingdom market but the European market. Until 20 December 1991, we thought that we were well on course in achieving that.
The Government produced a paper in March 1990, setting down proposals for dealing with our former colonial suppliers under the single European market. That working paper was unacceptable and the Government withdrew it. I believe that Ministers agreed that a new formula had to be found to guarantee the supply of bananas from the Windward islands in particular and from Afro-Caribbean and Pacific countries into Europe. They were moving toward a formula that would guarantee a quota on fruit coming into the European Community, a tariff on the price from major competitors in central and south America, and the ability of suppliers to get licences also to deal in fruit from central and south America.
In December, the Secretary-General of the general agreement on tariffs and trade organisation, Mr. Dunkel, produced a paper which he thought would offer a resolution to the Uruguay round of the GATT talks which would satisfy everybody. To my horror and to the horror of many hon. Members, he suggested that the banana should be included for the first time—it was never mentioned before—in the GATT round of talks, which completely cut across the steps that we had taken, in the right direction, in protecting those markets.
What are the consequences of our failing to find a solution that protects the traditional market for Wales? The port of Barry in my constituency is the home of Geest Banana Co. That prestigious and successful company imports 55 per cent. or therabouts of all the bananas that come into the United Kingdom. We are major banana consumers. In fact, we consume almost 500,000 tonnes of bananas a year. On average, every man, woman and child in the United Kingdom eats a banana once a week. One can do some quite marvellous things with bananas.
Only last night, I had the pleasure of going to a small but excellent restaurant in Waterloo, called South of the Border, and ate a Bali banana, which was a banana baked in pastry and served as an entree—absolutely wonderful. It is a beautiful fruit; it is part of our staple diet.
If we do not find a solution to the problem, Geest may no longer be able to operate from the port of Barry and may no longer remain the biggest importer of that fruit from the Windward islands. For Wales it will mean the loss of a substantial number of jobs—approximately 300 direct and indirect jobs. It will also mean the loss of a very successful company, the Barry Stevedores Co., which was set up two years ago. It is one of the most successful co-operatives and it depends on that trade. It will also mean a loss of prestige. When the right hon. and learned Member for Surrey, East (Sir G. Howe) was Lord President of the Council, he fondly recalled seeing the great banana boats going in and out of Barry bay. We may never see them again. That would be tragic not just for me, because it is my constituency, but for all hon. Members, because of that great Welsh tradition.
That trade has provided an historic link with the Windward islands. They are almost entirely dependent on the banana trade not only for their economic survival but for their social survival. If they lose access to the United Kingdom markets, it is almost certain that political chaos will reign in those countries, as they depend on the income from banana exports, which ranges from about 35 per cent. of the income of the smaller eastern Caribbean islands to 55 per cent. That could be lost overnight.
I discovered another disturbing feature when I recently had the opportunity to visit the islands and speak to the political leaders about their anxiety at the failure to reach an agreement for 1 January 1993, when the single European market comes into force. It took me by surprise. Until now, we have believed, and in speeches made in the House it has been pointed out, that if the Windward islands and other eastern Caribbean islands could not produce a legitimate cash crop of bananas, there is a danger that they might turn to producing illegal crops. On a weekly basis they have paid for 50,000 producers who own small plots of land. The danger is that they might start to grow ganja and export it to Europe and north America to substitute for a legitimate income.
The position is worse than that. The greatest fear is not that ganja will be grown and exported from the islands. The greater fear is that cocaine will be taken from Venezuela and Colombia to the islands, which will be used as trans-shipment areas for the European and north American drug markets. Dame Eugenia Charles told me, "The Europeans face a choice. They either continue to buy our bananas or their children may well buy cocaine that comes through these islands." We need to bear that in mind when considering the implications of our trade arrangements.
We also have a moral obligation to the Windward islands. I was delighted to extend civic and cultural links between Wales and the eastern Caribbean when I visited the islands. We should remember that the islands were former colonies of Britain. We encouraged them to produce bananas from the 1950s onwards. To that extent, we made them dependent on that fruit and, for many years, we benefited.
It is possible to buy bananas much more cheaply from the big multinationals such as Chiquita. Such bananas are grown on massive plantations on the large plains of central and south America. Cheap and sometimes slave labour is used to produce those bananas. The multinationals dominate the world market. So those of us who believe that, where appropriate, competition is a good thing see that if the multinationals are allowed to dominate the European market, which is the second largest in the world, there will be no competition whatever. The fruit from the West Indies is a different type of fruit. Its quality is superior to the bland and starchy, large, uniform in size and always unnatural in colour dollar banana, as it is called.
I wish to draw to the notice of the House the reason why I am so worried. All the other countries in the European Community—they have various arrangements and we must find a standard and universal formula—have agreed to object to including bananas in the Dunkel text in the GATT round. France, Portugal, Italy, Greece and Spain have objected. The only country that has not done so is the United Kingdom. I ask the Secretary of State to consider speaking to his colleagues in the Department of Trade and Industry and the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and to plead with them to insist that the banana is taken out of GATT.

Mr. Gwilym Jones: I agree with what the hon. Member for Vale of Glamorgan (Mr. Smith) said. In Cardiff we all know the importance of Geest. One of my good supporters is a master mariner, Captain Clive

Jenkins. We have been in correspondence recently. I endorse what the hon. Gentleman said to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State. I hope that an appropriate solution will be found to maintain the important banana trade through the port of Barry.
I was delighted to have the opportunity to listen to what may have been the last speech in Parliament of my hon. Friend the Member for Clwyd, North-West (Sir A. Meyer). I have always listened with interest to his speeches. They are a touch cynical, well considered and most compassionate. I often fancy that it is a pity that his talents were not better recognised and that at least some of his years were not spent on the Treasury Bench rather than the Back Bench. Had he been one of our Welsh Office Ministers during the past 13 years, our progress in Wales would have been more interesting and, I am sure, enriched.
I started my day this morning by listening to the radio. I was saddened to hear that our local councils in Wales have the worst record on community charge increases this year. From a study by the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy, I understand that councils are increasing the community charge by 11 per cent. in England, by more in Scotland, and by an average of 24 per cent. in Wales.

Mr. Alun Michael: Will the hon. Gentleman be precise? The study did not say that the Welsh result was the worst. It said that it was the highest, and it blamed the Government for that.

Mr. Jones: I leave the hon. Gentleman to develop his own argument, if he can, on that one.
Welsh local councils have produced the worst increases in the community charge. Perhaps we have been fooling ourselves by saying that, with only one or two exceptions, we have more moderate councils in Wales and that the most extreme left-wing councils are in England. An increase in community charges twice as bad as that in England suggests that that is wrong.
My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State certainly must maintain his capping powers to deal with local councils in Wales, for that is the last defence of the people of Wales against an extreme council. I know that it will not come to pass, but I am appalled at the prospect that if a Labour Government were elected, they would scrap the capping powers. My constituents in Cardiff, North would probably see the community charge double within weeks. South Glamorgan council, which is acknowledged as the most left-wing in Wales, has already published its intention to spend an extra £25 million over and above that which has already been agreed under the standard spending assessment.
Since we had our last St. David's day debate, VAT has been increased by 2·5 per cent. That has mitigated the community charge, especially in Wales. It is my personal preference that a greater contribution should be made by VAT. That is fairer as it is linked with ability to pay far more than mere possession of a house is.
I understand those who point out that the Government provide 93 per cent. of the spending by local councils in Wales. I understand when people in Wales say that it might be time to scrap the last 7 per cent. so that all spending by local councils is financed by the Treasury. That would be regrettable, but if it came to pass the councils would have only themselves to blame.
Happily, the reform of the financing of local councils has been resolved. As the hon. Member for Brecon and Radnor (Mr. Livsey) said, there are now great expectations in Wales for the reform of the structure of local councils. There is little love for large, remote councils. I was most interested to receive from the Welsh Counties Committee this week a document costing the administration of councils. It said that when authorities in Wales reach a size of 50,000 in population terms there is little difference in the cost of administering those councils.
In the same document, anxiety is expressed that if we had smaller councils some of them might have to rely to an extent on joint services. I have it on the authority of the chief executive of Cardiff city council, who has put this into perspective, that an average council in Wales employing a staff of 1,300 would need to have only 20 staff contracted or engaged in joint functions. Of course, that does not apply to Cardiff, the capital city of Wales. I shall not pursue my wish to see the capital city expand. That is a consideration for the future. I know that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has to consider all the representations that he has received about local councils in Wales, but I look forward to the earliest pronouncement from him. I want to see Cardiff made into a real capital again. I want it once more to be an independent capital city of Wales without an artificial tier of local government above it. To me, that is real devolution in Wales.
My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State was too diplomatic. I shall pursue his argument as to why the Labour party is scared to face devolution. Why can we not have a Welsh Grand Committee in the capital city of Wales? That would be the right place to hold such an important debate, and I claim credit for suggesting that at the last sitting of the Committee. Indeed, I have gone further than that and approached the Lord Mayor of Cardiff. The city hall is available, and it would be a perfect place to stage the debate.

Mr. Win Griffiths: On what date?

Mr. Jones: On more than one day, but if that does not suit the Labour party I have an alternative. I spoke to the managing director of HTV and suggested a television debate so that the people of Wales could watch it, and he readily agreed to host such a debate. That is another opportunity, if only Labour were not scared of facing it. I was pleased that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State suggested that the Leader of the Opposition should answer the debate. Clearly, the hon. Member for Alyn and Deeside (Mr. Jones) is ducking and dodging the issue.
I suggest that my right hon. Friend should go a stage further. I know that the matter was touched on in business questions today, but let us put a motion on the Order Paper to enable a sitting of the Welsh Grand Committee. Let my right hon. Friend take the initiative. Let us call Labour's bluff. If the Labour party stopped the motion going through, the matter would be resolved. The people of Wales would realise that the Labour party is stopping us having that debate.
The city of Cardiff is very much a city of enterprise. That is how it was built. It was once the second busiest port in the world, and the busiest coal port. Sadly, that was in its heyday and is no longer the case. However, we have exciting plans to redevelop the south of Cardiff.

Mr. John P. Smith: rose——

Mr. Jones: I cannot give way as I am under a time constraint.
The Cardiff bay barrage would totally transform our city. It would be a major environmental improvement and also an important flood defence. It would recoup the investment involved and generate up to 30,000 new jobs. It is a wonderful example of team work. Under the leadership of the Welsh Office, all political parties in Cardiff are happy for the scheme to progress. I understand that the Labour party has produced a new statement of its policies for Wales—it may have been entitled "Opportunity Wales"—but that this contained no mention of Cardiff bay and the redevelopment. How could that have been left out? It is too great an opportunity to be omitted by any responsible political party. I fear that there is only one reason: Labour is moving towards total opposition to the redevelopment of south Cardiff. If so, at the very least Opposition Members should be honest and say so. They will pay dearly in Cardiff if they do not continue to be positive supporters of those most exciting plans, which will benefit not only Cardiff but a wider area of south Wales. That is the positive way forward for our capital city and for the rest of Wales.
I am disappointed. All that I have heard from the Opposition today has been doom and gloom. The shadow Secretary of State made one pronouncement—that he would imitate my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State in introducing a Welsh language Bill. What agenda was he offering the people of Wales when he knows that there will be an election within a few short weeks? He can offer no alternative—or rather, I know the alternative: high tax, high interest rates, and high inflation. That is what the people of Wales would pay if we took that alternative. It would mean 19 per cent. more taxation on those who create jobs in Wales. As if that were not enough, it would also mean £20 more taxation a week on the average family and 9 per cent. more on savings. Up would go mortgages and inflation.
The alternative being offered to the people of Wales by the Opposition is like the Bourbons of France: they learn nothing and they forget nothing. I conclude by paraphrasing Oscar Wilde: it is the unelectable offering us the unendurable.

Mr. Martyn Jones: My area is suffering from the Government-created recession in the same way that many other hon. Members have outlined—with factory closures, homelessness, decaying schools and public transport cuts.
As a large part of my area is rural, many of the effects of the slump are hidden. Rural areas depend largely on farming for their culture and viability and it needs to be at least marginally profitable. As we have heard from other hon. Members, there is a crisis in farming. Farm incomes are at their lowest level in real terms since the second world war. Every month, 1,000 jobs in agriculture are being shed. More than 50 farmers a week have been leaving the land since 1980.
On top of the severe cuts in agricultural support, British farmers have had to cope with high United Kingdom interest rates, damaging food scares and UK regulations which are especially stringent and which have put British


farmers at a disadvantage compared with their continental neighbours. The level of farm debt is £7·4 billion, which is twice the level of 1981.
Uncertainty about the future is undermining many farmers, and in the present policy climate it is virtually impossible to plan ahead. We must acknowledge that farming needs at least five years of stability to plan for the future.
Investment is falling, and young people are leaving the industry. Although the number of people directly employed in agriculture has been falling, farming provides the backbone of the rural economy in my area. In addition to farmers, farm workers and their families, people are also employed in related service and supply trades, and all of them depend on a healthy farming industry for their livelihood. If farming is allowed to deteriorate any further in rural areas, the effects will be felt far beyond the farm gate.
As time is short, I must turn to another important subject, and I hope that the Minister will be able to give me some news tonight. Although rural areas have problems, it is still a joy to represent a beautiful part of the beautiful country of Wales, and to represent Llangollen, which is a beautiful town and has the distinction of being the base for the international Eisteddfod. I have the dubious distinction of being as old as the Eisteddfod, since it started in 1947.
Thanks to Clwyd county council being successful in obtaining project of regional and national importance—PRNI—approval for a permanent pavilion on that site, we have a unique opportunity to produce something which will benefit Wales and the world. The Eisteddfod is a wonderful institution which has had effects throughout the world for the past 45 years.

Mr. David Hunt: indicated assent.

Mr. Jones: It should be encouraged, and I know that the Secretary of State agrees, as I see him nodding.
I am sure that he is aware that, in addition to the PRNI approval for £2·1 million to build the pavilion, the Friends of Llangollen have raised about £500,000, which is a tremendous feat at a time when many people are suffering from compassion fatigue from all kinds of worthy projects. In addition to the £500,000, there has been support from Glyndwr and the Wales tourist board. The total project cost has been taken to £3·1 million.
The project has also benefited from a grant from the European Community to the value of £1 million towards the cost. Until now, that was the maximum that could be spent on the development. However I have been told that, since 1 January, there are new rules. I hope that that means that we can obtain European development funding for the money that the Friends of Llangollen have raised. There is a slight problem and I hope that the Minister will he able to help.

Mr. David Hunt: I must tell the hon. Gentleman that Clwyd county council has not formally approached my Department, but our respective officials have discussed the matter and perceive no difficulties at all.

Mr. Jones: I am delighted, and I thank the Secretary of State for that response.

Mr. Win Griffiths: There is soon to be an election.

Mr. Jones: I shall not endorse the churlish comments that my hon. Friend is making, no matter what I think.
I am delighted to hear that assurance from the Secretary of State and thank him whole-heartedly, but it has destroyed the rest of my speech. However, I shall carry on regardless, because it is worth explaining how such private funding can attract money from Europe. In itself, that is a good thing. I take it that the Secretary of State will agree to the possibility of transferring some capital allowance to cover the 12 months before we receive the money from Europe.
Clwyd county council is supporting another project delayed under the PRNI rules. At St. Asaph business park, there has been financial slippage and, although the county council has not applied, I understand that the Secretary of State would consider that application favourably. That would be wonderful as it would allow the pavilion to be brought up to standard while the contractors are on site. It is a genuine project of regional, national, and probably international importance. It will serve the people of Wales and the world for a long time to come.
I look forward to July, when I hope to visit the site as, I fondly hope, the Member of Parliament for that constituency. I want to see the project come to fruition, with all the necessary seating, toilet facilities and groundworks, which have not been done until now. It will be a fitting setting for the Llangollen Eisteddfod and for the music and the international camaraderie that that engenders. The people of the world will see that Wales can put such a project together. It will be a setting for the Eisteddfod for the next 45 years and I hope to be able to go there on my birthday in 45 years' time. In fact, I may even make the centenary.
I thank the Secretary of State once again for destroying my speech and giving Clwyd county council the ability to complete a worthwhile project.

Mr. Huw Edwards: Given what the Secretary of State offered to my hon. Friend the Member for Clwyd, South-West (Mr. Jones), if he is prepared to grant assisted area status to Monmouth immediately, I shall not continue my speech.

Mr. David Hunt: indicated dissent.

Mr. Edwards: Clearly, the Secretary of State will not do that. Therefore, I shall continue with my speech.
It is a privilege to contribute to the debate on Wales, which traditionally takes place on or near St. David's day. I have attended and have read the Hansard reports of those debates for a number of years, and it is a privilege to take part this year.
I represent a constituency that, historically, was not alway a part of Wales and it is one of the most anglicised areas of Wales. I noted what the Secretary of State said about the introduction of a Welsh language Bill and I welcome that. I am sure that he will also welcome the proposal to introduce a Welsh medium school in Abergavenny, which I hope will be implemented in the next year or so. The Secretary of State has acknowledged that, in my constituency, there is some anxiety about Welsh appearing in the national curriculum. I wish to convey those anxieties.
I hope that it is possible to attract, naturally, Welsh-speaking teachers to Gwent to involve them in the implementation of the language programme there.
Issues relating to the economy, the environment and public services are causing great concern in my constituency. I cannot deny that, traditionally, Monmouth has been one of the more affluent areas of Wales, but, in common with many other areas, it has been hit by the recession. I have had meetings with the Abergavenny chamber of trade and the Monmouth chamber of commerce and I have heard business people express their anxieties about the recession. It is a tremendous disappointment to come across people who thought they were enjoying an economic miracle two or three years ago who now face bankruptcy or have already gone bankrupt. Such bankruptcies also cause family problems and homelessness often goes with it.
The matter of assisted area status for Monmouth has caused some controversy and I have been disappointed by some recent developments. A delegation, of which I was a member, was to meet the Secretary of State to put the strong case for assisted area status. However, Monmouth borough council received a letter from the private secretary to the Secretary of State to the effect that, as Monmouth was not going to get assisted area status, there was absolutely no point in the Secretary of State meeting that delegation. Subsequently, another announcement was made to the effect that the Secretary of State was prepared to meet a delegation that was to include the Conservative candidate for Monmouth. If this meeting produces assisted area status for Monmouth before the next election, I would be the first to congratulate the Secretary of State, but I doubt whether that will happen. The delegation, which is supposed to meet the Secretary of State 'on Monday, is disintegrating before it is even assembled. Gwent county council and Monmouth chamber of commerce have decided not to participate and I doubt whether Monmouth town council will participate. They realise that it is nothing but a political stunt. They are totally unimpressed because they can see it for what it is.
My constituents are also anxious about threats to the local environment. My constituency covers 300 sq miles encompassing part of the south Wales coalfield right down to the Severn bridge. It is one of the most beautiful areas of Wales. There is also beauty in the bleakness—for example, up near Blaenavon and Pwll Du—but opencast developments pose a serious environmental threat to those areas. I have visited other opencast developments in south Wales at Nant Helen near Glynneath and I do not want such devastation to be visited upon Abergavenny. I hope that the Secretary of State will take note of the considerable objection to the Pwll Du development and listen to the people of Clydach and Llanelly Hill who are totally opposed to it.
At the other end of my constituency is the Wye valley, which is one of the five designated areas of outstanding natural beauty in Wales. There is much concern about proposed developments in that area, which are contrary to not only the Gwent structure plan but the intention of Parliament, which was to give special protection to the area. It is a matter of great anxiety that a precedent could be set by insensitive developments in the Wye valley. Such developments could also then take place in the other areas

of outstanding natural beauty, the Anglesey coast, Llyn, the Clwydian range and the Gower peninsula. There is considerable concern about any infringements in those areas.
I am glad that my hon. Friend the Member for Gower (Mr. Wardell) has announced that the Select Committee on Welsh Affairs is undertaking an inquiry into planning. There is widespread concern in my constituency about the whole planning process, much of which was revealed in an HTV documentary shortly before Christmas. The programme revealed the inconsistency, inequity and possible illegality in some of the planning applications and approvals that have been given and the way in which planning recommendations are overturned at a political whim. I am delighted that the Select Committee, of which I am a member, is undertaking that inquiry.
Wales has had a high tradition of good quality public services. The public sector in my constituency, as in many others, is by far the biggest employer, yet much of the public sector has been undermined by Conservative policies in the past 13 years.
I have spoken in the House before about the controversies affecting Nevill Hall hospital, but I will restrict my comments on that issue today to the proposal to introduce car parking charges. That proposal has absolutely outraged the people of Abergavenny and all who travel from the constituency of my right hon. Friend the Member for Blaenau Gwent (Mr. Foot)—many members of staff as well as patients come from his area to Nevill Hall—and elsewhere to the hospital.
The staff, patients, visitors and volunteers who give up their time to work in the hospital are outraged by the proposal. They say that the imposition of parking charges would infringe the principle of a free national health service. They see no support for the idea in the patients charter and they are bitterly opposed to it. They hope that such charges will not be implemented at Nevill Hall or any other hospital in Wales.
I have spoken before in the House about the housing crisis in Wales. I have said previously that £741 million has accrued from the sale of council houses in district authorities in Wales in the past 10 years and that it is a public scandal. I think I see the Under-Secretary shaking his head in dissent. Not only has that money not been devoted to the provision of housing, but even parliamentary answers have not explained what has happened to that money.

Mr. Nicholas Bennett: The sum of £741 million represents total receipts over the past 10 years. Most of that money has been spent by local authorities in credit approvals for local government expenditure on all sorts of capital projects. I have made it clear at Question Time in response to the hon. Gentleman that local authorities can use 25 per cent. for housing and the other 75 per cent. for capital redemption against credit approvals. If he does not understand that, he should not be in the House.

Mr. Edwards: Redeeming debt is not as high a priority as housing homeless people, and there is a growing crisis of homeless people in all our constituencies. If the Minister does not believe that, he should have been with me a few days ago when I went around the Rother estate in Abergavenny. The people in those council houses are appalled at the idea of there being no prospect of their


children finding local authority housing. There is nothing that they can buy in the private market and very little for them to rent in the housing association sector.
My constituency comprises many people of moderate means. They appreciate what has happened in the past 12 years, which is why last May they elected a Labour Member. I am confident that I shall have the privilege of representing them after the next general election.

Mr. Keith Raffan: The Welsh day debate is the highlight of the parliamentary year for the Principality. It is one of the far too few occasions when Welsh matters can be debated on the Floor of the House. That is yet a further strong argument why we need another debating forum for Welsh affairs. We need one not just as an all-Wales strategic tier on top of the unitary authorities, which I hope we will shortly have, but because there is such inadequate debate of Welsh matters in this House—far more inadequate than the debate of Scottish issues.
I wish to look beyond the dying embers of this Parliament to the issues that will dominate the next Parliament. As I shall not be a Member of it, I thought that I would have my say now. Two related issues are likely to dominate that Parliament. The first is the ever closer union of Europe, political and economic, and the second is constitutional change in the United Kingdom. Both are inevitable. Foolish men may try to resist the tide of history, but ultimately it will overwhelm them.
I am a committed, indeed passionate, European who is strongly in favour of further European integration. Those opposed to European unity tend to use the one word "sovereignty" as their ammunition. They seldom define what they mean by it. In the dictionary or thesaurus sense, sovereignty as
supreme and independent power, free from external control",
no longer exists.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (Mr. Heath), by taking us into the EEC in 1973, conceded sovereignty. When my right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher)—perhaps she would not care to remember it now as one of the most illustrious achievements of her distinguished career—agreed to the single market in 1985, she did the same and ceded further sovereignty. The present Prime Minister, in his former incarnation as Chancellor of the Exchequer, by joining the exchange rate mechanism in 1991, merged our sovereignty with that of our European partners by tying sterling more closely to their currencies.
Sovereignty is not a symbol to be worshipped from afar, an indissoluble whole which can only be preserved intact. It is a commodity to be bartered, ceded, pooled and shared in the interests of the people, for their economic benefit and well-being. There is no realism in speaking of sovereignty as sacrosanct when our interest rates are directly affected—some might even say dictated—by the Bundesbank, and when our economic affairs are so strongly influenced by German wage claims and the cost of German unification.
I believe that sovereignty will come back to us with a single currency. At least we shall have a seat on the board of a European central bank. No wonder the Bundesbank —my right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley too casually ignores this—is so guarded about monetary union. It foresees a loss of power and sovereignty.
I contend that there is no fear among the Welsh people at a loss of sovereignty in the cause of European union. Indeed, long ago the people of Wales largely lost sovereignty to Whitehall and Westminster, and I tend to agree with them that it might be better to lose it even further afield—further afield geographically—but to a place that is more sensitive to their needs and aspirations.
We in Wales see ever-closer union with Europe not as a threat but as an opportunity. It will give us a chance to come out of the shadow of our larger neighbour and vigorously to reassert our own identity within a Europe of the regions. Wales within Europe, just like Scotland within Europe—those concepts have an understandable appeal. The Government must recognise that appeal and respond to it.
On the European issue, my party is still resisting the tide of history, though less fiercely than it did before. It is also still out of tune, though less than previously under my right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley, with the mood of the moment. We say that our place is at the heart of Europe, yet we have not learnt the lesson of our delayed entry. We should be in the vanguard, but we are still in the rear. We are still dragging our feet.
It is a matter of great sadness to many of our European partners—I was speaking yesterday to some distinguished representatives of Spain—that we are not in the vanguard. They want us to be fully committed to, enthusiastic and wholehearted about, the Community—right at the heart of it—not just saying we are there but effectively acting there to counterbalance the increasing power of a resurgent Germany.
The European and constitutional issues are closely related. There is a delicious irony in the fact that the British Government, in the European context, is fiercely fighting against the centralisation of power in Brussels, while in the United Kingdom context they are determined to retain power in the centre, here in Whitehall and at Westminster. Britain is the largest unitary state in the world, apart from Japan. It is extremely centralised, even more so than France in practice. But we have already modified the supremacy of Parliament to accommodate the upward flow of power to Brussels. Why can we not also modify it in the opposite direction, by devolving power downwards? Indeed, devolution could offer the opportunity of an effective counterbalance to centralised decision-making in Brussels.
The principle of subsidiarity, to which we are committed at the European level, is equally valid within the United Kingdom. In a lecture to the Conservative party conference entitled "Conservatism in the 1990s", my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, who is perhaps one of the Cabinet's more adventurous thinkers, said:
In a more and more complex world, devolving decisions to the lowest level strikes me as a sensible precept. That is the approach that we have been pursuing at home, in health, in education and in housing. It makes good sense for Europe as well.
If it makes good sense in health, education, housing, and Europe, why not also for United Kingdom government?
The dispersal of power has been a central concern of political philosophers since Aristotle. Devolution as a concept is a particular British contribution to politics. It first appeared in a speech in the House in 1774 by Mr. Edmund Burke on the subject of American taxation. Burke is not normally thought of as an extreme, radical


thinker out of sympathy with Conservatism. He attempted to show that it was possible to reconcile American demands for local autonomy with imperial power centred in Britain. American legislators would have the freedom to decide domestic policies while being subordinate to the imperial Parliament.
When preparing his first home rule Bill, Gladstone—and I am sorry to have to tell this to the hon. Member for Ceredigion and Pembroke, North (Mr. Howells)—did not resort to the tomes of distinguished Liberal political thinkers but went straight to the speeches of Edmund Burke, studied them closely, and remarked that they were
a mine of gold for the political wisdom with which they are charged.
Gladstone was also influenced by his political mentor, Sir Robert Peel—founder of the modern Conservative party —and his conviction that our institutions could be successfully adapted to the needs of a particular time.
Devolution is not therefore alien to Conservatism but an innate part of it. Gladstone concluded:
the concession of local self-government is not the way to sap or impair, but the way to strengthen and consolidate unity. Such a policy is eminently a Conservative policy.
That is why I find it so surprising that members of my own Front Bench do not acknowledge that devolution as a concept and policy has distinguished Conservative antecedents, indeed originated with Conservative political thinkers.
If in the view of Ministers the case for constitutional change is unproven, they should explain in detail why they think it is. It is not enough for them to dismiss the question with tabloid slogans or historical quotations, for that will only diminish their reputations. They must heed the mood for change and respond to it. They cannot ignore or dismiss it.
No party which is so lamentably weak as ours is in representation in Scotland and in the Principality and which has gone—I nearly used the word "run", but I respect my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State too much—to England for its last two Secretaries of State can afford to do other than to take the issue seriously and debate it fully.
There must be an end to the current intellectual inertia on this side of the House on the issue of constitutional change. If there is not, I fear for the future of the Conservative party in Wales after the next general election. Our moral authority to govern Wales with a handful of Members of Parliament will be gravely, if not fatally, undermined and we will find ourselves facing a constitutional crisis—a crisis of our own making.

Mr. Win Griffiths: Although I recognise that the Welsh environment is improving in many respects, it would be a dereliction of duty not to point to a number of serious problems that have yet to be overcome. I refer first to water quality. Ministers trumpet readily enough that the privatisation of the water industry has resulted in the availability of more investment than the Government themselves were prepared to make. However, throughout the 1980s, the Government gave a low priority to the quality of drinking water and of our waterways, which affected our coastline. Despite the belated efforts to tackle pollution in Wales, serious problems remain.
The Government are also bold to declaim the powers and effectiveness of the National Rivers Authority, yet it is not given the money that it considers necessary to do its job. In the 1980s, for the first time in 50 years, river water quality in Wales deteriorated. Even more worrying is the increase in pollution incidents throughout the 1980s and into the 1990s. In 1990, there were 2,707, and that is not good enough.
Worse still, such incidents result in few prosecutions —and when they are successfully brought, only pitiful fines are imposed. In the two years that Welsh Water has been in existence, it has been fined for 17 pollution incidents a sum of only just over £18,000. In the first year of its existence, it made profits of £120 million; and in the first six months of its second year in operation, the company made profits of more than £60 million. The fines imposed on Welsh Water, therefore, represent no kind of penalty. In fact, it is cheaper for a company to pollute the aquatic environment than to meet the cost of 100 per cent. pollution prevention.

Mr. Nicholas Bennett: When Labour was last in power, it cut investment in the water industry by 50 per cent. It is hypocritical of the hon. Gentleman to criticise this Government, who established the National Rivers Authority, which has a budget of £431 million for Wales this year. This Government also increased water pollution fines tenfold in the Environmental Protection Act 1990. Welsh Water has already done tremendous work, and the National Rivers Authority is working hard—and this year the quality of water in Welsh rivers actually improved.

Mr. Griffiths: The Minister's panegyrics on the quality of Welsh water and the work of the NRA run counter to certain facts. It is indisputable that Welsh Water was fined only £18,000 for 17 pollution incidents and that the quality of Welsh river water has deteriorated over the past decade. It is also indisputable that NRA funding is less than the minimum that it considers necessary to do its job properly.
Let me remind the Minister that, in October 1991, the Government announced a 12 per cent. cut in funding for the National Rivers Authority; and that, in November, it was announced that, in the 1992–93 financial year, the NRA would receive £15 million less than—in the NRA's view—it needed to do even the minimum to improve water quality.
I emphasise that point because, very often, a single incident of pollution can utterly destroy life in a river. It is important to enter into the minds and the culture of those on Welsh Water, and other companies whose industrial emissions end up in our rivers. In any one year, a single incident of pollution is one too many; and the record of the first two years of the 1990s does not bode well for the rest of the decade.
It is not only the aquatic environment that is threatened. Although considerable improvements were made in the 1960s and 1970s, our air quality is now in danger. The Government are not committed to the European Community standard, which requires the stabilising of carbon dioxide emissions at 1990 levels by the year 2000. They appear to be prepared to countenance air pollution simply because other countries are not willing to take action. They have put it on record that they do not intend to meet the stabilisation target unless other countries do the same. If we do not give a lead, however, how can we expect others to commit themselves?
I believe that the quality of the Welsh environment is too important to be left to the decision-making powers of an American President. We need to take a lead for ourselves, and, if necessary, to show the Americans the way. I am sure that, once they had perceived the significant advantages to he gained from commitment to the lowering of pollution levels, they would follow suit.
The sooner such madcap schemes as the burning of orimulsion down in Pembroke are jettisoned, the better. It would be welcome to hear from the Minister that, unless full anti-pollution measures are adopted, that scheme will not get off the ground. Without such measures, I believe that it should be shelved.

Mr. Dafydd Wigley: A Welsh day debate is a bit of a stock-taking exercise. It is difficult, in the space of 10 minutes, to deliver a full audit on developments in Wales and the effect of Government policies there.
The future is mixed: there is good news and bad news. There have been welcome developments over the past year, and even over the past few months. We should welcome wholeheartedly developments involving factories and other aspects of industry, whose significance far exceeds their scale. The hon. Member for Delyn (Mr. Raffan) is trying to introduce a measure to allow the Wales tourist board to export work overseas to bring people to Wales. That measure has all-party support, and is long overdue. Last week, the Welsh Development Agency and Welsh local authorities jointly opened an office in Brussels. Many of us have canvassed for such an office for a long time, and it will have an important role to play.
Nevertheless, some aspects of the present position cause considerable worry. An obvious example is unemployment, which has increased by 30 per cent. over the past 12 months. There are unemployment blackspots throughout Wales. Let us take the south Pembrokeshire figures, which should be close to the heart of the Under-Secretary of State. Not only are they high now; they are projected to reach even higher levels—disastrously high, following the closures at Trecwn and Brawdy. In the valleys—in the Cynon valley, for instance—unemployment is unacceptably high, as it is in rural Wales. In south Cardiganshire, in my constituency, and in Holyhead, something needs to be done about the level of unemployment. Indeed, that applies in every part of Wales—north, south, east and west.
The other major problem facing ordinary people in Wales, especially those who cannot get a job, is their inability to obtain housing. Someone who cannot afford to buy will have precious little hope of being able to rent in the present circumstances. Council housing stock has declined; much of it has been sold off. I understand the policy involved, and I understand people's wish to buy their houses, but the stock has not been replaced. There is a waiting list of 60,000 in Wales, and nearly 10,000 people are homeless.
In a civilised society, that is unacceptable. If people cannot obtain jobs or houses, what are we doing to our country? The Government should admit that the problems are serious and must be tackled.
There are also problems in the health sector. I was pleased to hear from the Secretary of State that, during the coming year, the provision of a hospital to serve east Dwyfor and north Meirionnydd will go ahead. I hope that

the other community hospitals that are needed in Gwynedd and elsewhere will also receive the resources that they need: without Government money, such projects cannot proceed.
Challenges exist in health care, education, the environment—we heard about that a moment ago—employment and housing. I now wish, however, to address two of the themes that the Secretary of State introduced. It appears that, at long last, a new Welsh language Bill is to be introduced. I accept that the Secretary of State has been in possession of the draft of the Welsh Language Board's most recent version for only a little over 12 months; however, the subject has been under Welsh Office scrutiny for the best part of six years. I remember attending a meeting in October 1986, with Lord Prys-Davies, the right hon. Member for Conwy (Sir W. Roberts) and Mr. Nicholas Edwards, then Secretary of State. Work has been in progress ever since, and it is time that we saw some action.
The question is: what sort of action will we see? What will the Bill contain? It is not enough to legislate for the sake of legislating; we must get things done. The Welsh language faces challenges that must be dealt with.
In an earlier intervention, I cited the position of a defendant in a court case who wanted to speak Welsh. In years gone by, how many people who were not very good at expressing themselves in English—if, indeed, they could speak it at all—have appeared before the courts, and have not been able to testify in their own language? How many innocent people have gone to prison, or even lost their lives, for that reason? I do not pretend that that happens now, but the fact remains that the defendant in a case is the person on whom the maximum pressure is exerted. If defendants wish their cases to be heard in Welsh, they should be able to do so. It is a question of linguistic rights.
Equally, if a defendant's evidence is to be heard and understood by the jury, it must not be heard in translation. The nuances, the emotion and the uncertainties must be heard and felt first hand.
I understand that, in some parts of Wales, the shortage of Welsh speakers would make random jury selection impossible. In other parts, however, that is patently possible. Cases should be heard in Welsh in areas in which Welsh is spoken. There are centres within travelling distance where that can be done: Cardiff, for example, can serve a catchment area in Glamorgan and Gwent.
Today, 800 people have demonstrated in Swansea because of the inability to provide Welsh language education in that city and the area surrounding it. That should be a basic education right for people who want their children to be educated using the Welsh language. The people of Swansea have lost the opportunity for generations to be educated by means of the Welsh language because provision for it has not been made.
Will the Bill address that question? Will it ensure that equal validity is a meaningful concept? Will it ensure that an individual filling in a form can choose to fill it in either in Welsh or in English? It is official bilingualism that makes equal validity meaningful to the consumer, to whom the Secretary of State referred in his speech.
If people working in Welsh factories who speak Welsh find that somebody tells them that they cannot speak in their own language to their fellow workers on the factory floor, will the Bill stop that discrimination? Will it make that discrimination, which has happened year after year in


Wales, illegal? When the Government introduce the Bill —if they have the opportunity to do so after the election —that is one of the issues that we shall consider.
I was under the impression that there was to be a debate in the Welsh Grand Committee, sitting in the capital city of Cardiff, on the government of Wales. I understand, though, that there is some doubt about that. It appears that all that the Government have to do is to lay an order. Those who do not want a debate to take place on the important question of the government of Wales should speak up and be identified. I do not know which party is creating difficulties. Certainly it is not my party. If those who do not want self-government for Wales fail to turn up in Cardiff, having been challenged to do so, so be it. Those who are concerned about the future government of Wales should be allowed to put forward their ideas so that they can be thrashed out before the general election. Then there will be an opportunity for a real debate during the election campaign.
Opinion polls published this week show that there is a majority of two to one in favour of an elected, all-Wales body and that that majority increases to 70:30 if a similar proposal for Scotland—some form of Scottish parliament —were put forward. That 70:30 figure shows a majority in favour of the proposition in north, mid and south Wales among the elderly, the middle aged and young people and that majority includes people from every political party, including Conservative voters in Wales. It is time that the message got home if a proper balance is to be secured within the European structure to which the hon. Member for Delyn (Mr. Raffan) referred.
We have to think of Wales, Scotland and the rest of the United Kingdom as part of a united Europe, if there is to be a meaningful relationship between Wales and the committee for the regions. The Secretary of State has not said whether there will be Welsh representatives on that committee and how many seats Wales will have. These are important questions. Without an all-Wales level of government, Welsh voices will have no legitimacy in Europe and there will be no democracy in Wales.
The unpalatable truth for the Secretary of State and for the others who sit on the Treasury Bench is that never since 1868 have the Conservatives had a majority of seats in Wales. They do not have a legitimate right to govern Wales. The time has come to allow the people of Wales to have a voice in the government of their own affairs and to decide on the social and economic priorities for Wales. Wales needs a Chamber that can devote all the time that is necessary to the problems that face our country and that can devise policies which meet the aspirations of our people. That is the challenge that faces the Conservative Government and every party in the House. They must come clean and be open about what is being offered to the people of Wales. They must move towards that goal.

Mr. Rhodri Morgan: The hon. Member for Caernarfon (Mr. Wigley) and many others referred to the clean-up of government in Wales. A corrupt system of quangos now governs Wales. The members of those quangos are mates of the Secretary of State for Wales. He staffs all the quangos of Wales with his mates. The hon. Member for Cardiff, North (Mr. Jones) said that he

envisaged devolution as single-tier authorities, roughly similar to the present districts. He says that that is the sort of devolution that Wales wants, but he forgets that Wales already has a great deal of devolution. The problem is that it is not democratic devolution. We have devolution by quango, by nomination and by patronage. Such devolution permits the Secretary of State to put Tory rejects—people rejected by the Welsh electorate—or Tory trainees—people who are going to be rejected by the Welsh electorate at the next election—on quangos so that they can develop a little administrative or governmental experience and earn a few bob, moonlighting as it were, by means of this non-democratic form of devolution.
The people of Wales object to that. Why should a Tory Government, who are rejected by the people of Wales, run Wales through nominated bodies that the Secretary of State can use as a form of re-start scheme for semi-employed Tories who have no chance of winning elections in Wales? They obtain power that they cannot win by democratic means—through the ballot box—by means of the Secretary of State's patronage. That is a fundamentally corrupt system. Even as late as last month, with an election in the offing, the Government decided to set up yet more quangos. A higher education funding council for Wales is to be set up. Who do they put upon it? They put on it Sir Idrys Pearce—no doubt a very distinguished figure, but it is not insignificant that he was the Tory candidate for Neath in 1959. I see the Minister of State looking quizzically over his spectacles at me as though I am wrong about the identity of the gentleman concerned. I should like to think that I am wrong, so perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will get up and tell me that I am wrong. That is yet another person on a long list of people who have lost their deposit or who have lost out on being elected in Wales but have been rewarded for their loyalty to the Tory party by being made chairs or vice chairs of various bodies.
There was a day when the big five who were seen as very important to the life of Wales were the Welsh rugby selectors. People went in awe of them. That no longer applies. The big five now are those who are chairs or vice chairs of more than one quango in Wales at the same time. Those five people are John Elfed Jones, the chairman of Welsh Water which was a quango at the time although it has now been transformed into a private company; he is also on the Welsh Language Board; Dr. Gwyn Jones of the Welsh Development Agency and the BBC broadcasting council for Wales; Sir Donald Walters, the vice chair of the Welsh Development Agency and chairman of the council of University college, Cardiff; Geoffrey Inkin, chair of the Land Authority for Wales and of the Cardiff Bay Development Corporation; and Mr. John Allen, chairman of Tai Cymru, or Housing for Wales, and vice chairman, under Geoffrey Inkin, of the Land Authority for Wales. The Tories do not have all that many people to put on those quangos, so they put them on to two quangos at a time. The reason is that the Tories do not trust many people in Wales, because not many people in Wales trust the Tories. Apart from those five people, they cannot find anyone else whom they regard as trustworthy enough and safe enough to serve on quangos.
At a time when the Tory Government are so unpopular, they realise that these chaps go to the same dinner parties and therefore they form part of a little freemasonry which runs Wales, with the Secretary of State's assistance. That arrangement is about as ethical as the day Caligula


appointed his horse a pro-consul in the outer reaches of the Roman empire. At the election, the people of Wales will reject what the Tories have done.
Quangos are devolution without democracy. It is high time that democracy was put into devolution. Under this extremely corrupt system, in which all those people are mates of the Secretary of State, they all throw their weight about to a completely unacceptable extent. Only last week at a meeting of the court of University college, Cardiff, complaints were made that Cardiff Bay Development Corporation was blocking a development in south Cardiff. The college is extremely keen about opening up a third campus. It wants to spend £69 million, which would create hundreds of construction jobs and hundreds of places for students in University college, Cardiff.
Of course, the Cardiff Bay Development Corporation is throwing its weight around saying, "We don't really like this." It does not have to submit that view to any open and democratic test. If it does not feel like it, it blocks it. It means that the ideal financial year has already been lost. The window during the recession would have meant that the land could be bought cheaply, cheap building contracts could be obtained, and the momentum would have got going. That would assist in the creation of those thousands of jobs in Cardiff bay to which the hon. Member for Cardiff, North referred. The reality is that the quangos are blocking those new jobs. It is the opposite of the picture that the hon. Member for Cardiff, North tried to paint.
South Glamorgan health authority is another quango run by a rejected Conservative politician, Mr. Alun Jones. He is close to the Secretary of State and is attempting to hide from the people of Cardiff, West and the rest of south Glamorgan the hidden agenda for closing Rookwood hospital—a rehabilitation hospital—the Prince of Wales Orthopaedic hospital in my constituency, and Cardiff Royal Infirmary in the constituency of the hon. Member for Cardiff, Central (Mr. Grist).

Mr. Grist: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Morgan: I am sorry, but it is impossible under the 10-minutes rule.
Since Mr. Jones is a mate of the Secretary of State, the right hon. Gentleman will not let him down and announce just before the election that those hospitals are to be closed. They are major hospitals and none of them has fewer than 150 beds. We find out about the proposed closure only when a document is leaked to the local press.
The Welsh Development Agency is in an interesting state at the moment. The Public Accounts Committee is investigating how the chairman elect came to have a grant of £ 17,500. The following year the WDA made it clear that the old corn mill in Porthmadoc, for which the grant was made available under the rural conversion grant scheme, did not qualify. Two and a half years later, the chairman has started to pay back that grant. The money is being paid back only after probing by myself and investigating journalists and with the prospect of an investigation by the Public Accounts Committee. That gap of two and a half years between notification and the money being paid back would not be a privilege applying to any small private business man, but it occurs when one is a mate of the Secretary of State and attends the same dinners. There is the temptation not to obey the same rules as ordinary small business men. That is what is so appallingly corrupt. There will always be the temptation to make up the rules

because the Secretary of State will offer protection. I have been told that the shredder at the Welsh Development Agency is likely to need a new motor by the end of this week. I appreciate that that was said in humour, but it is an interesting and worrying comment. I hope that it is not true, as the WDA has to produce a note for the Public Accounts Committee about what happened in the dealings between the chairman and the WDA.
Despite the blithe confidence shown by the Secretary of State in the future of the Welsh economy, a wave of bankruptcies is passing across Wales. The companies involved include Hailey Park Motors, Cladcolor Profiling, Precision Circuits in Cwmbran, Baverstock's Hotel, EC Computers in Cardiff and the Three Salmons Hotel Group. The greatest bankruptcy of all is the bankruptcy of the Government's economic policy.

Mr. Ray Powell: I was tempted not to participate in this debate, because I know that many of my colleagues wish to speak and because most of my day has been spent launching the proposals for the new building in Parliament street. I should like to put on record the fact that, in the Committee dealing with phase 2 of the accommodation, we have total co-operation from Government Members. Unfortunately, I cannot say the same for matters concerning Wales.
When the Secretary of State was a member of the usual channels, I always thought that he had a pleasant disposition and was above all sorts of intrigues. When he was appointed Secretary of State, I congratulated him as I had congratulated his predecessor. I congratulated his predecessor because he represents Worcester, which is where my parents were born.
Many figures for unemployment levels are bandied about. It is worth putting on record the facts since 1979. Part of the area that I represented then is now represented by my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgend (Mr. Griffiths). The Boundary Commission decided to carve up the constituency in the hope of creating a Tory seat. For the first three or four years, that was successful, but we have changed that now, as on 9 April we intend to change many more Tory seats.
In 1979, my constituency of Ogmore had a working population of 100,000. Without all the distorted record keeping that has been imposed on us by the Tory Government, there was 3·7 per cent. unemployment. A total of 2 per cent. of that 3·7 per cent. were unemployable, as they were ex-miners suffering from silicosis or pneumoconiosis. In 1979, there were seven pits in the Ogmore constituency, employing 7,800 miners. There were many others employed in the industry, in transport and so on and in the many other industries connected with mining.
From 1979 to 1982–83, every pit in that constituency was closed. In addition, the de-manning of the steelworks at Margam, introduced by the Tory Government, led to 12,000 redundant steelworkers, most of whom were constituents of Ogmore. Within three years, 20,000 of my constituents were put out of work. Ministers continue to tell us that unemployment is low in Ogmore. Hon. Members who represent constituencies in Wales and hold surgeries there know the facts. I know that the Secretary of


State cannot hold any surgeries in Wales in order to know what the people of Wales are thinking, because he does not represent a Welsh constituency.
People do not seem to recognise that Wales is represented by 26 Labour Members, six Conservative Members, three Plaid Cymru Members and three Liberal Democrats. Whenever there are negotiations on any issue, the majority party—the Labour party—should be consulted first. Instead of that, the tail is wagging the dog and occasionally shaking the dog about. The six Tory Members dominate negotiations because we have a Tory Government.
We have had a disaster in Ogmore since 1979. I have given the facts and figures, but on the broader issues we look to the experts to give us the details. The expert on housing is Shelter. No one can suggest that it is dominated solely by the Labour party or trades union movement. I am sure that the Secretary of State has received a copy of Shelter's document. It refers to the housing crisis that now affects all parts of Wales. It
estimates that 65,000 people will have experienced homelessness in one form or another in Wales in 1991"—
65,000 people homeless in Wales, not in London.
Some of us have worked as volunteers on the soup kitchens, going down to Victoria embankment at midnight to give the homeless cups of soup, chocolate or tea. I wonder whether any Minister is compassionate enough to do that. If he is, perhaps he will think about the 65,000 homeless people in Wales and the thousands of unemployed construction workers who are crying out for a job. They could easily be employed if the Government were to be more compassionate in allocating funds to enable local authorities to build council houses and to house those 65,000 homeless people.
Shelter states:
almost one hundred thousand homes in Wales were considered unfit or lacking basic facilities in the last government survey of house conditions.
Shelter Cymru's case and enquiry statistics are one of the most complete records of housing problems in Wales. The most recent figures show: increasing young homelessness, increasing mortgage arrears and repossessions, increasing illegal evictions, increasing debt and eviction. The housing crisis can affect anyone at anytime, as just some of the enquiries on a typical day at a Shelter Cymru Housing Rights Centre show.

Mr. Edwards: Those statistics show the housing crisis in Wales. Does my hon. Friend agree that the Secretary of State should show how each district authority in Wales is spending 25 per cent. of its capital receipts on housing? If that is what the Government claim, can they prove it?

Mr. Powell: I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who covers the point.
In my opening remarks, I referred to the Secretary of State and the compassion that I thought he had when he took office and my reasons for extending him congratulations. I regret that, since taking office, the situation has become drastically worse.
I must refer also to another document—I accept that most of its authors are members of the Labour party or affiliated to it—produced by Wales TUC: "The Training Deficit in Wales and the Wasted Talents". I do not have time to quote from it, because you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, are telling me to wind up. I will do so at your request, but I urge the Secretary of State and the few Welsh

Conservative Members to look at the document, which shows conclusively how ridiculous training in Wales has become and how badly we have been treated, especially in reduced funding for TECs.

Dr. John Marek: My hon. Friend the Member for Ogmore (Mr. Powell) went to the root of what concerns the people of Wales before the next general election. I am a committed devolutionist, but that is not a topic on which people will decide how to vote. I urge hon. Friends who are concerned about devolution and the Welsh language not to mix them up, because if they do the cause of devolution will not be well served. It is important to keep the issues separate.
I want to concentrate on the bread-and-butter issues that concern my constituents. Brymbo steel works made a profit in each of the last 20 years of its existence, yet it was allowed to be closed down by a Conservative Administration who believe more in political dogma than common sense. United Engineering Steels will take two years to clear the site, and then there will be two or three years of opencast mining or redevelopment. It may be up to another two years before any factories appear on the site and jobs are created. That is not good enough. It will be six or seven years before another job appears on the site.
The Secretary of State has to consider that issue, which is essential to people in Brymbo. It is now a dismal place. The ISERBS payments have run out. People do not have money and cannot go out in the evening or be social. The situation will worsen as redundancy payments run out. So far, the Government have not given any hint of anything better to come.
After the general election, my hon. Friend the Member for Alyn and Deeside (Mr. Jones) will be Secretary of State. I shall look to him to ensure that United Engineering Steels does not take two years to clear off the site. It should take two weeks or perhaps four weeks. We want some action, and I would prefer action by the Conservative Administration in the time that they have left.
There have been developments in the past 13 years of Conservative rule, but they have been rather second-class. The A55 dual carriageway is not finished. It has dangerous junctions where one can turn right against oncoming traffic. People will continue to be killed simply because the Government have not allowed sufficient expenditure to build a proper underpass.
The Wrexham bypass is a dual carriageway. There is an at-grade junction at Croesfoel that the Government are belatedly going to grade separate. How much extra will that cost five years later? Ruabon bypass is dual carriageway. Newbridge bypass is 7 m wide and the Chirk bypass is 10 m wide, all because of public expenditure cuts and dogma. That would not have been allowed to happen on the continent. There would have been a uniform grade for the A483 from its junction with the Chester southerly bypass down to the Coventry bypass.
I asked the Minister of State at Welsh questions on Monday to give a pledge that, if a Conservative Administration are returned to office, InterCity services will continue to run between Euston and Holyhead—a simple, straightforward pledge. I am concerned about InterCity services continuing to run to Holyhead if the Government are returned and they privatise the rail


system. The constituency of the right hon. Member for Conwy (Sir W. Roberts) will be affected, and his electors want to know where he stands on the issue. Of course it is a political point, but we are in a political Chamber. If he can give a pledge, I will give way.

Sir Wyn Roberts: As I told the hon. Gentleman on Monday, the whole point of privatisation is to improve services and that, of course, applies to InterCity services.

Dr. Marek: It is fine if the right hon. Gentleman is going to improve InterCity services between Euston and Manchester or Euston and Liverpool, but let us be specific. There is a straightforward way of giving a pledge which everyone in north Wales will understand and that is to say, "Yes, we will ensure a continuation of InterCity services to Holyhead." That is the phraseology that reasonable people understand, and I should like to hear it from the Minister.
At the moment, our InterCity service is not complete. We have only two high-speed train sets to Holyhead and we need three. There has again been overcrowding in recent weeks and I look to the Welsh Office to help to get from British Rail a third HST set so that we can have five InterCity trains in each direction each day.
There is a lot of unease in the Wrexham Maelor hospital. The expression of intent that has recently been sent to the Welsh Office refers to contact being made with fund-holding doctors in Chester and the surrounding areas. That upsets my constituents, because it is clear that fund-holding doctors will get priority, and if they happen to be in Chester or elsewhere in England, they will get priority over my constituents in Wrexham. That is not how I envisage that the national health service should work.
I bitterly resent the commercialisation that has been introduced. The expression of intent document also contains phrases about public relations exercises being undertaken to ensure that any opposition is kept to the minimum. That is not what it is about. People are not visibly opposing the Government at the moment, because they know that a general election is coming, but let us be clear that commercialisation will not happen under a Labour Government. It will be swept away.
There has been no new public or council housing in the Wrexham area this year. I have said it before and I say it again—the leader of Wrexham Maelor borough council said that he had £12 million of ready money that he had obtained from the sale of council houses. Houses had been sold, but no new ones were to be built. In fact, I believe that there is more than £12 million, but it cannot be used by the borough council because the Welsh Office has prevented it. However, there are 2,000 or 3,000 people on the waiting list in Wrexham, of whom 1,000 desperately want a home.
That was the very point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Ogmore. The money is available, but it is not being used. What nonsense to have such a system. It is a question not of the borough council having to borrow the money and pay interest on it but of its not being allowed to use it.
We have perhaps one more week of business followed by the Budget the following week, and it is likely that the election will then be announced. The Government have run up to the buffers. The opinion polls rightly show that people in Wales desperately want a Labour

Administration, not another Conservative Administration. I believe that this time the Government have been caught out in their handling of the economy.
The Secretary of State said that there was a world recession, but he did not say which other country in the European Community is suffering a recession at the moment—Germany, just, and that is because of East Germany. No other country is suffering a recession. Our recession is a home-grown recession. The Government began with a recession in 1979, 1980 and 1981. Inflation went up to 23 per cent. We then had the "loadsamoney" economy, and we now have another recession. The public will not be fooled this time. In three or four weeks' time, I shall see my hon. Friend the Member for Alyn and Deeside sitting on the Government Front Bench behind the Dispatch Box.

Mr. Donald Anderson: I do not intend to criticise the Secretary of State personally, but he has to work within a self-imposed constraint of Thatcherism and now Majorism which means "public bad, private good". There are still examples of that ideological obsession, especially with regard to British Rail with which I shall deal in a moment.
More importantly, the Secretary of State does not represent a Welsh constituency. That has a number of effects, one of which is that he is unaware in his surgery of the problems that I and my colleagues encounter every time that we meet our constituents. Those problems include the slump in housing and difficulties arising from the Government's public expenditure policies. I give the Secretary of State one example.
On Saturday last week, I met an individual who said that he had submitted a detailed application for a discretionary renovation grant in July last year. He is on income support and his wife is registered blind. The ceiling of their home in the St. Thomas area of Swansea has collapsed. He has been told
that the Council is no longer in a position to approve any discretionary grants for the immediate future
because of a change in Welsh Office policy. The Secretary of State may pull the levers in Cardiff, but he is unaware of the effects of policies on individuals at the micro level.
The appropriate officer in Swansea city council promises me that he will examine the gentleman's house to see whether
conditions have deteriorated to the point that a mandatory application can be considered. This is far from satisfactory and only serves as an encouragement to some people to allow their houses to fall into serious disrepair.
What an indictment of a policy designed to treat houses in Wales, which has the greatest proportion of pre-1919 houses of any region. The circumstances which I have described may be an unintended effect of the new priorities within the Welsh Office system, but we are brought face to face with such effects on individuals who live with the ceilings in their houses falling down.
As the Secretary of State does not hold a Welsh seat, he does not experience those effects and therefore remains unaware of the effect of the policies that he puts into operation. That is one reason why the fact that he does not hold a Welsh seat is wrong. It is also wrong because it shows a complete lack of confidence by the Prime Minister and others in the competence of members of the Conservative party who currently hold seats in Wales.

Sir Wyn Roberts: Surely the hon. Gentleman is aware that in one year we have spent more on renovation and repair than the previous Labour Government did during their entire period in office.

Mr. Anderson: That remark shows that even those who represent Welsh seats can get just as out of touch. The slump in house building in Wales did not come about by chance, because of some malign fate; it came about because of the reduction in public priorities for council and other forms of building. The fact that more is being spent on renovation is welcome, but I am talking about the effects—possibly unintentional—of policies which have come about because the Secretary of State does not have an intimate connection with the impact of Welsh Office policies on people in his constituency.
The main part of what I wanted to say has already been dealt with by my hon. Friends, who have talked about the effects of Government policies on housing and education, and the way in which the social fabric of Wales has been damaged. That damage has been done by the Government's obsession with private good at all costs, and their failure to see the interdependence of the public and private sectors. If any area in the United Kingdom depends on a positive public expenditure policy, it is Wales. As a result, Wales suffers the most from the Government's obsession to promote the private sector at all costs.
I understand that the Minister of State will reply on transport, so I address my remarks on that subject to him. We in south Wales remember that the M4 was completed by the 1970s. Since that time, transport policy has concentrated on north Wales, to the disadvantage of the south—so much so that, for example, the missing link between Baglan and Lonlas, in my constituency, remains to be completed. Happily, it will be completed soon, as it has had such an adverse effect on our area.
The Severn bridge tolls are increasing, not just because of inflation and other such factors but because of the Government's decision to privatise the new bridge, and that affects tolls on the existing bridge. When business men consider locating in Wales, Severn bridge tolls are bound to be a major disadvantage. Any geographer, or anyone who knows how industrialists take decisions on location, will say that distance remains a key factor. The Severn bridge and its tolls are bound to have a substantial adverse effect.
On the railway, the current high-speed trains represent the technology of the 1960s. They came into service in the early 1970s in south Wales, and since then the quality of rail services has deteriorated. Journey times between London and Swansea are longer, the sleeper service has gone, and services at the beginning and end of the day have been chopped.
I hope that, in the six weeks or so left to the Secretary of State in his present job, he will consider the European dimension, and examine the impact of the channel tunnel on Wales. What effect will the change from Waterloo to Stratford and King's Cross have on the accessibility of the channel tunnel to Welsh travellers? What will be done about the crossover from Paddington to King's Cross?
Because of the Government's parsimony and the harsh conditions that they impose on British Rail with regard to electrification and because by the end of the century, even

if we are lucky, only a small proportion of the west line will be electrified, Wales will lose out again, and become a peripheral part of Europe.
I shall finish by talking about the Welsh dimension. The Secretary of State spoke passionately about it, and its impact on Government decisions. An old Baptist minister of mine said that he was advised by a more experienced minister that if one's argument was bad one should raise one's voice. Certainly the Secretary of State—usually so moderate and gentle—suddenly began to raise his voice and flash his eyes when he talked about the Welsh dimension.
Surely the Secretary of State must realise that, at an all-Wales level, there is a great vacuum in the governmental structure. We remember that after the 1979 referendum the right hon. Gentleman's predecessor, Nicholas Edwards—Lord Crickhowell—said that there would be a Welsh forum. However, that idea has been allowed to go to sleep. Much has happened since then.
As for the European dimension, I am delighted that the Secretary of State and his predecessor went to the motor regions of Baden-Wurttemberg, Catalonia, Lombardy and elsewhere. While in Baden-Wurttemberg, did he find that the good citizens of that land were concerned about the amount of money that they were spending on their land government? Did he ask them about their system; did he find any great anxiety about the decentralisation of opinion-making in the federal republic structure? I offer the following thought to the Secretary of State: his party, which calls itself a unionist party, may by its intransigence destroy the Union, not only because of the policies of the past decade but because of the Government's failure to acknowledge what is happening. In Scotland, there is a strong view that the Scots want to run their own affairs and enjoy a degree of democratic control over their institutions. To a lesser extent, that applies to Wales too, and that feeling has been strengthened by the developments of the past decade.
The Secretary of State must also recognise that he has caused much offence in Wales by carrying political cronyism to a new art form. He has placemen in a number of quangos, yet while in opposition his party used to criticise precisely that. It is an immense affront to the people of Wales. I do not suggest that these quangos should be wholly or even mainly peopled by those of a radical disposition, but the opinion polls in Wales show that the Conservative party represents but a small fraction of the Welsh people. The right hon. Gentleman has packed the health authorities and all the other quangos with his cronies. He can hardly criticise us if, following a change of Government in six weeks' time, we learn one or two lessons from the rather brutal way in which he has put his cronies into those non-elected bodies.
We heard what the Secretary of State said about his willingness to announce his decisions affecting local government within a reasonable period. He knows that at least two counties have gone well beyond his guidelines on the poll tax. He appeared not to be aware of that—or else he wanted to avoid the issue at this stage. Does he still intend to use the unit set up in the Welsh Office to charge cap authorities which are not profligate but which are forced, just to provide basic services, to go beyond the guidelines that he set?
I think that I have gone over the guidelines that others have set for me in this debate, so I intend to sit down soon.


One thing is sure—the days of the Government and of the Secretary of State are numbered, and there will be a great sigh of relief and much joy in Wales when their time is up.

Mr. Michael Foot: I am very glad to have the chance to participate in this debate. I should like to discuss my own constituency first and then move on to some larger matters which also impinge on what is happening there.
The Secretary of State for Wales referred to the garden festival which we are to have in Ebbw Vale. I certainly agree that it will be a great event for my constituents and for Wales. In fact, it will be the best of all the garden festivals. I am glad to acknowledge the right hon. Gentleman's part at one critical moment, and at some others, in setting up the festival. At one especially critical moment, he gave us great assistance, and I am happy to acknowledge that.
Having studied the matter—the Secretary of State will understand that I have been closely associated with the festival from the beginning—I know that the bodies chiefly responsible for ensuring that our plan won the competition—it was won against stiff competition, as my hon. Friends from other parts of Wales can testify—were Blaenau Gwent council and Gwent county council. They worked together, and I hope that by doing that they have taught the Secretary of State a few lessons about the virtues of local government. Conservative Governments do not understand local government, but I am sure that the Secretary of State is aware that the proposal could not have been put forward without the local authorities taking a risk and showing imagination and intelligence.

Mr. David Hunt: indicated assent.

Mr. Foot: I see that the Secretary of State has achnowledged that.
I hope that the Secretary of State will be equally forthright about the question raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Monmouth (Mr. Edwards), who referred to the opencast mining operation which British Coal would like to operate at Pwll Du. It would be an utter absurdity for our valley if, having seen the possibilities under the garden festival arrangements, British Coal decided to ruin the upper valleys for the next 10 or 12 years through that operation.
The Secretary of State for Wales does not have much time left in office. I have raised the issue of the operation at Pwll Du with him on many occasions. In fact, when he was first appointed as Secretary of State, I wrote to him saying that that was one of the issues with which we would like him to deal. That was quite a long time ago. He could have put the kybosh on it. That would have saved a lot of money, and he can still do it.
When the Secretary of State's predecessor left office, I wrote to him advising him to read the parable of the unjust steward. Not many people understand that parable properly and I recommend it to the present Secretary of State. If the right hon. Gentleman reads it with a proper sense of his own delinquencies—I am sure that he has, although I do not want to mention things like the poll tax—he will understand that, even when an injustice has occurred on the scale for which the right hon. Gentleman and his predecessor are responsible, he can still make atonement at the last moment.
Pwll Du would have figured well in that New Testament parable. I am not so eminent on these matters as some of my colleagues and I do not like to preach sermons other than to Secretaries of State who still need to learn a lot. Even in the short time left to the Secretary of State, when he goes to the office tomorrow perhaps he will read the parable and settle the problem with Pwll Du in the next few days. My hon. Friend the Member for Monmouth will be in this place after the general election to ensure that the problem is solved and he has played a prominent part in putting the case for Pwll Du ever since he was elected. I hope that that will make the Government determined to do something about the matter.
I want now to consider the larger issues. They may not be larger issues than what happens in constituencies because nothing can be larger than what happens there. However, the Secretary of State sometimes refers to the deadly, dangerous or highly objectionable things that are happening in our constituencies which have nothing much to do with real developments. I am afraid that that is a serious misunderstanding of the scale of the problems that we face in this second terrible recession.
All Wales, particularly the valley towns, was hit hard in 1979, 1980, 1981, 1982 and 1983. I remember that devastation. Unemployment rose from 12 per cent. to 24 per cent. in a few years. Not one house was built. Every housing plan was stopped for two or three years, and we still do not have agreement to go ahead in one part. We were devastated.
Of course, there was a huge loss to our economies and to our people when the Government poured down the drain the amount of money that they had to spend to maintain unemployment at 21 to 24 per cent. That is what we had to endure from 1979 until 1983. Of course we did not wish to retain the old industries in the old manner, but we said that such transformations must be done gradually and intelligently. If one hacks away at old industries before one has a proper plan for putting in new ones, one will undermine and destroy our communities and return to the horrors of the 1930s. Wales suffered more from such policies than nearly any other country.
We thought and we learnt from those events. Indeed, from 1945 until the Government came to office at the end of the 1970s, we had the most essential support for our sane regional policy, backed by real finance. Partly, that was done through local authorities and by a Government who understood that that was the way that it should be done. They knew how to spend the money and organise the policy. Partly, it was done by direct regional policies, and we worked them out.
After the crisis of the latter years of the 1970s, we had worked out a more careful, adventurous regional policy than we had ever had before, and we were putting it into operation. In my constituency, we were the first to do that because we had the biggest rundown in the steel industry, but we did it in other parts of Wales, and we were setting the pattern for the rest of the country.
The Secretary of State should not be consulting at this late stage; he should have learnt a long time ago, because we told him time and again at every available opportunity. He and his predecessors came to us and said, "We have a different and better regional policy for you; you do not have to worry." We objected most strongly to the drastic cuts that they made in the regional rate support grant. Every local authority in Wales had to suffer in that respect. We have suffered as much as anybody. On top of that, the


right hon. Gentleman and his predecessors said, "We have much better ideas for regional policy. We will do away with regional grants and assistance. You don't have to worry much because we'll find something just as good to substitute, and we will do that on a more discriminatory basis," or whatever the words were. Of course, they have wrecked our regional policy and all the advantages that were introduced primarily by the Labour Government. My right hon. Friend the Member for Swansea, West (Mr. Williams), when he was at the Welsh Office, worked out our plans. We had special development area status for places that were hit by 10 to 20 per cent. unemployment. Those plans were in operation for years, but the Conservative Government took them from us.
The Secretary of State's predecessor thought that he knew a bit more about these matters—he was not an old Thatcherite like some of those whom we had to put up with before. He had even heard and thought that Keynesian ideas had some advantages. I refer to the right hon. Member for Worcester (Mr. Walker), and I am sure that he would not disown what I am saying. Even he said, in effect, "I have to agree with the nonsense that they agree in London and carry out the same policies that those half-wits are imposing on England." I was not discussing everything with him in biblical terms, but he was saying, "Look at what they are doing in England," and I was saying, "Do we really have to go through it?" He said, "I'm afraid that those are the policies." We warned the Government time and again. The Secretary of State will confirm that.
Monitoring committees were set up in our time by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Aberavon (Mr. Morris), the then Secretary of State. We had special plans whereby local authorities, county councils, the Secretary of State and the Welsh Office could work out a plan for the changeover. We planned to ensure that we did not have huge dents of mass unemployment thrust upon us again. But now we have unemployment again not only in my constituency but in so many others. To have it again after 10 years is a disgrace.
If the Secretary of State wishes to come again to my constituency, I will show him the garden festival, but I will also take him on a tour of my neighbouring town of Tredegar to see what is happening there. I have been the Member of Parliament for that constituency for 32 years and I am ashamed at what is happening. Other towns such as Llanhilleth and Abertillery have similar problems.
In Tredegar we had a problem which was a classic microcosm of the Government's policies coming to fruition. I will tell the House exactly what happened. We had the buses privatised. It was all to be a wonderful plan to make the buses more efficient. Then a few weeks ago the privatised bus company went bankrupt. Of course, that was all part of the plan. But it was also part of the plan that the receivers would refuse to take over the bus station because they might have to apply safety laws and it would be too difficult. So for a whole period the buses of the collapsed company did not know where to go. The whole town of Tredegar was thrown into chaos by what had happened. When we turned to the local authority to rescue the buses from the chaos caused by privatisation and the mad pursuit of ideas by the Welsh Office, it said that it did

not have the powers. Local authorities do not have the powers to do everything that they want and, of course, they do not have the money to run the buses properly.
I shall be happy to take the Secretary of State to Tredegar if he is happy to visit it before the election. He will be safer there than in some other places. We will look after him. I will show him the main street of Tredegar. I hope that he will be as ashamed as I am. He will see shop after shop that has been closed by his recession. Shop after shop has been wrecked either by the new rating system or the combination of that with the recession. Time and again we have been hit. It is a shame that it should happen once, but for it to happen twice in 10 years is a scandal of the worst order. I should not be true to the people who sent me here if I did not say these things as strongly as I can. I have sent the Secretary of State messages on the matter, as I have on other issues.
I hope that the next Government who come to power will learn the lessons. I do not believe that it was through ill will on the part of the Secretary of State that he achieved the results that I have described, any more than I thought it of his predecessor. They are the two unjust stewards. It is not a question of ill will. The results that I have described were caused by allegiance to policies which have no relevance to our modern world. Through such policies, the Government turned their back on the real experience of what happens in industrial areas when it is necessary to change from one type of industry to another. We are in favour of doing that when it is necessary. The Secretary of State said earlier that we had delayed the change, but we simply wanted to do it more slowly. It is possible to do it more humanely and to keep communities together. In the end, that is a much less expensive way of bringing about the change than thrusting whole areas into economic ruin and thinking that they can pull themselves out every three or four years.
I thought that the Secretary of State had learnt a lesson, or that some members of the Government had, after one terrible recession, but it has taken two terrible recessions to teach them that lesson. That is two too many. I hope that the new Government will have a proper plan to ensure that never again shall we suffer the afflictions that we have had be bear. Central Government and local government can act together. I believe that the Secretary of State has learnt some lessons about that, but he will have to carry it much further if we are to see for Wales that which it deserves.

Mr. Alun Michael: It is always a pleasure to hear my right hon. Friend the Member for Blaenau Gwent (Mr. Foot) speak in the House, with his authority and his experience—what a contrast with the beginning of the debate.
When one listened to the Secretary of State for Wales no one would have thought that we have had devastating trade figures today, which demonstrate the depth of the recession and the long-term cost of the Government's failure to act. Exports are down by 7·5 per cent. That is yet another illustration of the Government's failure to manage the economy. Our industrialists in Wales are fighting for their survival and that of their companies against that background. From the Secretary of State's speech one would not have thought that there was a problem. All we heard was a glitzy piece of over-optimistic public relations and a failure to face facts.
For weeks, the St. David's day debate has been hyped-up with the expectation of a statement on the Welsh language from the Secretary of State. In contrast, his announcement was pathetic. The Secretary of State did not make a proper statement. There was not enough substance or detail in his speech for him to answer questions from hon. Members. He showed complacency over education in the Welsh language. He praised the Welsh Language Board and placed it on a statutory basis, but he has not listened to its advice, and has wasted more than a year in failing to build on the consensus which has developed in Wales during the past five years.
Why does the Secretary of State suddenly come to the House with precisely the promise that he was asked to make a year ago? Why has he not put a Welsh language Bill into law in the past year? All he has done is fulfil the prediction that we made in the past year: that he would do nothing until he was brought up short by the threat of an election.
The hon. Member for Caernarfon (Mr. Wigley) rightly concentrated on unemployment and homelessness, before turning to the Welsh language Bill. After the election, I look forward to discussing the detailed issues he raised, both in the House and in the Standing Committee which will deal with the Bill that we introduce, keeping the promise that we made more than one year ago.
The Secretary of State has done less today than we asked of him a year ago, and less than we promised to do had the Prime Minister dared to call an election then. If he had been serious, the Bill that he promises today as jam tomorrow would already be on the statute book.
The Secretary of State rejected the idea of an elected assembly, while closing his mind to change. The Exocet from Delyn, his hon. Friend the Member for Delyn (Mr. Raffan), made a thoughtful speech, which the Secretary of State should read, mark and inwardly digest before he comes back to pontificate—if he retains his role in the shadow Cabinet after the election. The fact is that, with the honourable exceptions of the hon. Members for Delyn and for Clwyd, North-West (Sir A. Meyer), the Conservative party has run away from the debate.
The hon. Member for Cardiff, North (Mr. Jones) suggested that we should debate devolution. That was a little foolish of him when the Secretary of State is under such attack from his own Benches. The Labour party in Wales has had its debate and made proposals, which are public, clear and there for all the Welsh people to see. The hon. Member for Cardiff, North wants a televised debate. He wants the Conservative party to go into that debate with a lack of policy, of principle and of position.
What about a televised debate on the national health service in Wales? That is the sort of debate that my constituents are concerned about, as my hon. Friend the Member for Gower (Mr. Wardell) said. Important as other issues are, why is the NHS in Wales not an important issue for the Conservative party?
What about a televised debate on unemployment, and the devastation that the Government have created? What about a debate on homelessness, or on the Government's neglect of our schools? The Government will not allow a debate or a vote to those hospitals in local areas that are threatened by opting out or to those who work in the hospitals and care about the national health service. The Government are not interested in debate.
The hon. Member for Cardiff, North was unwise to make a petty party political point on the Cardiff Bay

Barrage Bill. On a constituency point, I remind the hon. Gentleman that, if he and the Secretary of State had pulled in all the Conservative votes or if the Bill had been a Government one, it would now be law. The hon. Gentleman shoots himself in the foot, as assuredly as he shoots the Secretary of State for Wales in the back.
Even more damaging, the hon. Member for Cardiff, North repeated his usual nonsense in his attack on local government services in Cardiff. With his experience in local government, he should defend local authorities and the electors in his constituency instead of acting as a Back-Bench poodle for successive Secretaries of State. The hon. Gentleman has blamed local authorities time after time when they are struggling to overcome the difficulties that Conservative Governments have placed upon them.
In support of that I shall quote not a politician in local government, but from a neutral statement by the city treasurer in Cardiff:
The budget process has been dominated by the threat of charge capping, which has brought a degree of risk and uncertainty that is undesirable in the financial decisions of public authorities.
That is the criticism made by Mr. Peter Brown.
The Government's fixing of the figures for standard spending assessments, with no consideration for need, mean that Cardiff city council has had to cut £1·4 million simply to achieve a standstill budget—last year's budget plus inflation. That is the effect of the Government's decisions.
South Glamorgan county council is in a similar position. To achieve a standstill budget, it has had to make cuts of £4·5 million. That has led to cuts in youth work and adult education. One can respect the decision of local councillors to protect the basic services of the schools, but it is short-sightedness for the Government to force such choices on local authorities which lead to cuts in necessary facilities. For example, the local authority in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Torfaen (Mr. Murphy) has had to take devastating decisions to close badly needed facilities.
All that has come at a time when the Home Secretary has suddenly discovered that one needs to knit services together and that it is not just policing, but the working together of services and the provision of activities for young people that lead to the reduction of crime. The Home Secretary has had a blinding insight, which he had rejected when we previously put it to him. That has happened just as the Secretary of State for the Environment and the Secretary of State for Wales are devastating the services provided by local authorities.
The Government's expectations for local authorities and their predictions for their finance are unrealistic. What is that all about? It is about the Government's poll tax and the way that it is run. It remains with us. We have heard in the debate about U-turns and people changing their minds, but we have not heard the Secretary of State for Wales and his colleagues apologise for the poll tax.
Let me remind the House of the voting on the poll tax. There were 11 opportunities to vote for the poll tax, which were taken with enthusiasm by the Minister of State—the right hon. Member for Conwy (Sir W. Roberts)—and the hon. Members for Cardiff, Central (Mr. Grist), for Delyn and for Cardiff, North.

Mr. Raffan: It was a mistake.

Mr. Michael: The hon. Member for Delyn has the grace to apologise, and I respect his willingness to do that.
The hon. Member for Pembroke (Mr. Bennett) voted for the poll tax nine times only. Perhaps he was abroad on the other two occasions, because I do not imagine that he lacked enthusiasm for it.
Apart from the change of heart of the hon. Member for Delyn, the hon. Member for Clwyd, North-West showed an honourable nil in his voting record. I pay tribute to him for being more far-sighted than his hon. Friends and the Secretary of State for Wales.
The hon. Member for Cardiff, Central gave us some interesting reminiscences in what will be his farewell speech.

Mr. John Morris: Valedictory.

Mr. Michael: Yes, my right hon. and learned Friend uses the posh word for farewell.
The hon. Member for Cardiff, Central seemed to blame family breakdown and human misery on everybody except himself and the Conservatives. He fails to appreciate that the realities of social change have been with us for some time and should have been recognised. The Government have failed to act on obvious dangers and are responsible for the misery of homelessness throughout the communities of Wales, much of which could have been avoided had they acted.
Throughout Wales—I saw this in the early 1970s, when I was a councillor—as we built local authority houses and were able to house people, so surgery lists went down. Later, as the Conservatives got to grips with housing in Wales, the surgery queues increased and the misery suffered by the people on those lists became worse. The Conservatives have failed to recognise the reality of what they should have tackled.
The hon. Member for Cardiff, Central talked of hospitals, as though every hospital in Wales was gleaming and sparkling new. In his constituency, the Cardiff royal infirmary is rundown and devastated. Repairs costing £20 million are needed to the University hospital of Wales, and there is planning blight on the health authority and on hospital services throughout south Glamorgan.

Mr. Grist: The major repairs needed to the University hospital of Wales arose in the days of a Labour Government. I recall what happened in 1968 in relation to the concrete that was put in, although I do not think that any blame attaches to the Government of the time. I spoke of the breakdown of family life, the rising divorce rate, the alienation of children from their step-parents leading to the breakdown of families and rows in families leading to homelessness. All the statistics show that the breakdown of personal relationships creates most of the homelessness.

Mr. Michael: I am tempted to say that that is a piece of bloody nonsense—[Interruption.]—but I shall restrain myself. Changes have taken place in society, and the Government have failed to recognise them, while other changes, particularly homelessness, have been created by the Conservatives. It is ridiculous for the hon. Gentleman to close his eyes to that fact. He referred to the cash that was needed for the University hospital of Wales. That money must be found, but the Government have given no answers about how it will be found. No doubt they will leave it as part of their legacy to an incoming Labour Government.
My hon. Friend the Member for Monmouth (Mr. Edwards) referred to the scandal of low wages and the Government's deliberate third-world approach to turn Wales into a low-wage economy. It seems that the Conservatives want the people of Wales to be poor. That is why they oppose legislation for a minimum wage. Such a move would hurt the economy, they say. Why can we not learn from other countries—and suffer, for example, the economic difficulties that the Germans have had in the last decade? Why is it impossible for Conservative Members to recognise what has worked in other countries?
My hon. Friend the Member for Swansea, East (Mr. Anderson) was right to criticise the decline in rail services and to talk of the cancelled, late and dirty trains and the removal of late London-Cardiff trains. We need trains both ways late at night if the economy of a city and tourism and entertainment are to develop. We need a link to Europe and a strengthening of the Cardiff and valley services. The local authorities have recognised that need and put money into it from South Glamorgan and Mid-Glamorgan, but the Government have repeatedly failed to recognise the need for investment in our rail services.
My hon. Friend the Member for Swansea, East referred also to housing and the misery of homelessness in his constituency. The same point was made by my hon. Friend the Member for Gower who pointed to the horrors that had arisen from Government housing policy in Swansea and surrounding areas. Those policies have undermined family life and damaged often responsible and caring parents and their families. My hon. Friends and I see that all too often as we deal with the problems of our constituents.
The problems of children in Wales, and the United Kingdom generally, were highlighted in a neutral report from National Childrens Homes. The detail of the report revealed the position in Wales for poor families, with poor nutrition, and showed that the effects of eroded child benefit were scandalous in the United Kingdom generally but were worst of all in Wales.
There has been a breakdown of law and order in recent years, and the Government have not accepted sensible suggestions about working together to divert young people from some of the activities in which they have indulged. Indeed, delinquency has almost been encouraged by the Government's disregard of the Sunday trading issue.
It was left to my hon. Friend the Member for Ogmore (Mr. Powell) to produce what was in effect a White Paper that the Government should have published, and to present a detailed Bill that the Government ought to have introduced. Instead, the Government avoided debate on that sensible measure and prevented the House from taking a constructive approach—leaving responsible local authorities, such as Cardiff city council, to try to enforce the current law.
My hon. Friend the Member for Vale of Glamorgan (Mr. Smith) told the House a great deal about the place of the banana in the cuisine of our nation. He was making a serious point about the jobs and future of the port of Barry that I hope will be taken seriously.
There is an international perspective to the problems that confront us. The Secretary of State said that international companies have demonstrated confidence in Wales. They have—in responding to the excellent work of local authorities, the sympathy of trade unions, the Welsh Development Agency—the establishment of which was


opposed by the Conservative party—and the positive experiences of companies that have already come to Wales and know the support they enjoy from the Principality. We need to ensure next that secondary manufacturing is sourced within Wales, and that the WDA's work is devolved to each part of the Principality so that it can approach economic development in partnership with local firms and authorities.
Over the past 10 years, a number of my right hon. and hon. Friends have spoken of the jobs lost in mining and many other industries. I may tell the Minister of State, Welsh Office that, when I recently visited the constituency that he represents, Conwy, I found that Hotpoint. Denis and Ferranti felt that they have been left to suffer the effects of Government policies without Government help. The same point was made at meetings with industrialists in Cardiff. There is general concern about ministerial complacency, with one industrialist telling me only last week, "Ministers don't seem to recognise that this recession is cutting not into the fat but into the muscle and fitness of our industries, which will be desperately needed as they work towards recovery."
After 13 years, we have a right to ask what the Government have done for the people of Wales. Have they helped the old? No, the Government have robbed them of their pensions. Have they helped the young? No, the Government have taken from them opportunities for training and the chance of employment, and have encouraged delinquency. Have they helped the middle-aged? No, they have suffered the mortgage burden that is the result of the Government's economic mismanagement. Have they helped industry and commerce? No, and the voices of people in industry condemn the Government for their failure to help. Have they helped the sick and disabled? No, the Government have attacked and undermined the national health service, introducing care in the community without providing the cash and resources needed to do the job properly.
Have the Government helped anybody? They have helped only those failed Conservative candidates who have been given fat salaries to serve on unaccountable quangos.
This evening, we heard valedictory speeches from two hon. Members who will not be standing at the next general election. We all regard with great affection the hon. Member for Clwyd, North-West, and we listened with pleasure to that great parliamentarian, my right hon. Friend the Member for Blaenau Gwent. He spoke with authority and eloquence of the devastation and economic damage suffered by our valley communities under this Conservative Government's economic mismanagement.
The hon. Member for Clwyd, North-West gave the Labour party credit for good intentions, but said that the road to hell was paved with good intentions. The road to heaven is not paved with the policies and intentions of the present Government. With the Labour party under the firm leadership of my right hon. Friend the Member for Islwyn (Mr. Kinnock), we start with good intentions, sound principles and clear plans—and we have a chance of not ending up in the hell of human misery, unemployment, homelessness, and poverty that the Conservative Government have left us as their legacy of 13 wasted years.
Thank goodness there are only a few weeks to go before the people of Wales can celebrate having a Secretary of State elected by Welsh constituents, in a Labour

Government led with power and authority by my right hon. Friend the Member for Islwyn, and with Welsh talent on the Government Benches. That cannot come too soon.

The Minister of State, Welsh Office (Sir Wyn Roberts): This has been a wide-ranging debate, to say the least. We have been able to take in the Windward islands and the banana trade, owing to the interests of the hon. Member for Vale of Glamorgan (Mr. Smith)—including the Geest operation at Barry.
This may well be the last occasion on which I shall address the serried ranks of Opposition Members before the walls of their optimism tumble down at the next general election.
First, let me say a few words about the roads programme, with which my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State did not have time to deal in his opening speech. During this financial year, three major schemes will have been completed, including the magnificent Conwy tunnel, opened by Her Majesty the Queen on 25 October. During the same period, a further three contracts have been let. They are the M4/A4042 Brynglas tunnels and Malpas relief road scheme, the A483 Welshpool bypass and the M4 Briton Ferry to Earlswood scheme.
Far from being satisfied with those achievements, the Government remain committed to an extensive road programme. Today, we have published this year's supplement to "Roads in Wales".
A start should be made on a further six schemes during the coming financial year: the A487 Port Dinorwic bypass; the M4 Baglan to Briton Ferry scheme, which I am sure will cause delight to the hon. Member for Swansea, East (Mr. Anderson) when he can manage it; the A55 Aber improvement; the M4 link to the second Severn crossing; and the A465 Glynneath to Aberdulais improvement.
As hon. Members will know, powers have now been granted to construct the second Severn crossing and the associated road links on both sides of the estuary. Construction of the new bridge is likely to start around the end of April, and the whole scheme will, we hope, be open to traffic by 1995, as my right hon. Friend said. The new bridge—which is to be privately financed and operated—will more than double the road capacity across the Severn estuary. I am sure that all hon. Members will welcome this vital and most important development for south Wales. The new crossing will bring with it the potential for considerable domestic economic benefits.
The hon. Member for Wrexham (Dr. Marek) asked about British Rail. Let me tell him that the best guarantee for the London-Holyhead services is the use that passengers make of them. Ministers do not run British Rail.
We are glad of the general welcome that was given to my right hon. Friend's proposal to introduce a Welsh language Bill. I am pleased to say that the proposal has been welcomed outside the House as well, by the Confederation of British Industry in Wales.

Dr. Marek: Will the Minister give way?

Sir Wyn Roberts: I have moved on from the subject raised by the hon. Gentleman. I have little time left.
No Government have done more to support and promote the Welsh language than the present Government. We have established Welsh as an integral part of the national curriculum——

Dr. Marek: Will the Minister give way?

Sir Wyn Roberts: I have already dealt with the hon. Gentleman's point.
Welsh is being taught in an increasing number of schools in Wales. Since 1979, we have spent some £25 million in support of Welsh language education alone. We have increased direct funding to voluntary organisations promoting the Welsh language from only £350,000 in 1978 to £7·6 million next year.

Dr. Marek: Will the Minister give way?

Sir Wyn Roberts: I know that Opposition Members do not want to hear what I am saying. They are determined to wreck my final speech in this St. David's day debate. The hon. Member for Wrexham is being incited to interrupt by Opposition Front Benchers.
We established the Welsh Language Board in 1988 to advise Ministers on matters relating to the language. They have done valuable work in preparing not only proposals for legislation but guidelines for the public and private sectors. These have been welcomed and acted upon. I have been particularly impressed, for example, by the way in which the Department of Social Security has produced a package of forms and documents in Welsh. My right hon. Friend's announcement today will ensure that that work goes forward.
There is extensive evidence that the Welsh people as a whole wish the language to flourish. Its survival ultimately depends upon the will of those who know it to use it in their daily lives and to pass on their knowledge to their children. No Government can legislate a language into life. They can only provide a favourable framework for its use. We shall continue to do that.
The criticism to which the 1967 Act, passed by the Labour Government of that time, is now subjected shows the importance of taking care over the preparation of legislation. Section 3 of that Act, which relates to the possibility that English can take precedence over Welsh in the case of disputes, was intended to be no more than a means of resolving uncertainties over two versions of the same text. However, that section is seen increasingly as granting a lesser status to the Welsh language more generally. I am pleased that we shall be able to take the opportunity provided by the legislation that we propose to remove the confusion that has been created by the section.
The difficulties that surround the 1967 Act further serve to underline the importance of taking great care over the preparation of legislation. That we shall do. The Welsh language is so important that we must get the legislation right.

Mr. Alex Carlile: A new Welsh language Act would be very welcome, but will there be a right for children to attend a secondary school, if their parents so wish, where the medium of instruction is exclusively Welsh throughout the school?

Sir Wyn Roberts: The hon. and learned Gentleman knows that his question must be addressed in the context

of education legislation as a whole—in the context, too, of the duties of local education authorities and of the reasonableness of the requests made to them. That ethos and ambience have to be taken into account when answering his question. As the hon. and learned Gentleman knows, the number of schools in Wales that do not teach Welsh to some extent is becoming ever smaller.
I must turn to——

Dr. Marek: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: Order. I have heard nothing out of order.

Dr. Marek: I believe that the Minister has been misleading the House. [Interruption.]

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman must not say that.

Dr. Marek: How can it be in order for the Minister to urge people to use the train to Holyhead when he himself uses a——

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman is attempting to raise a question with the Minister through the guise of a point of order, and that is out of order.

Sir Wyn Roberts: I turn to the speech of the hon. Member for Alyn and Deeside (Mr. Jones). He must hold the record for totally negative speeches. Today he seems to wallow in gloom and doom, rather like a happy hippopotamus. On Monday, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Wales described him as agony aunt, but in my book agony aunts always give positive advice. The hon. Member for Alyn and Deeside is more like one of those who write to agony aunts. I am beginning to wonder whether he writes to some of his safe socialist friends such as Clare Rayner, who attended the £500 champagne bash at the Berkeley hotel to raise funds for the party. If so, I wonder what he says to her. My mole has been at work.

Mr. Michael: rose——

Sir Wyn Roberts: I must tell the House of the sort of letter that I think that the hon. Gentleman might write. It would say:
Dear Auntie Clare,
We've got this awful election coming up and if we win, which I very much doubt, I could become Secretary of State for Wales. I don't really want the beastly job and all the hard work that goes with it, so I am planning to palm off as much as I can to an Assembly in Cardiff so that they can take the blame for anything that goes wrong. What do you think?
The reply would say:
Don't worry, it will never happen.
During the debate we have heard remarkably little about Labour party policies, even the finger-in-the-wind policies referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for Clwyd, North-West (Sir A. Meyer). We heard nothing of its education policies in our debate in the Welsh Grand Committee. It was left to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and I to refer to the policy document. Is the Labour party ashamed of its policies? Other people are ashamed of them, as I mentioned in the Welsh Grand Committee. The two American experts commissioned by The Sunday Times to investigate our education system said of the Labour party's policies:
The Labour Party is a lost cause when it comes to education reform … The Labour Party is trapped by its past, a defender of the status quo, and a purveyor of old, hopelessly out-moded ideas.


Of the Labour party's proposal for an educational standards commission the experts said:
this hardly deserves to be called a reform. It is more of the same from a party that appears incapable, politically and ideologically, of offering anything different.
We have heard nothing of the Labour party's destructive, bureaucratic NHS reforms. It plans to sweep away the NHS trusts and general practitioner fund holders. Is it ashamed of those reforms? Others are, including The Times, which wrote:
The last thing the NHS wants is another upheaval to take it back to the old days.
The news that the Labour party means to abandon the recent reform of the NHS should it ever come to power is immensely depressing. Reform was needed. The Tory reforms are in the right direction and are gaining ever wider acceptance within the NHS.
We have heard nothing of the Labour party's alternative policies for dealing with the recession. Labour has failed miserably to pin the blame for the recession on the Government. The recession is worldwide and everybody knows it. People know that the companies for which they work, such as Hotpoint and Hoover, are facing a lack of customer demand that extends far beyond our shores, to our export markets in Europe and the United States.
Labour has failed to grasp that taking money out of people's pockets through increased taxation and national insurance is a sure-fire way of worsening and prolonging the recession. Every worker in manufacturing industry knows that we need to increase demand for products.
The Labour party has failed to grasp that the key to recovery is competitiveness. Its political somersaults on major issues will go down in history as the biggest volte face of all time. Labour Members will be known as the most desperate political trimmers of this century and the most dangerous since Sweeney Todd. All the chopping and changing of views, policies and principles and all their inconsistency have come about because they have seen their political credo discredited. Socialism has failed worldwide.
Undaunted by that reversal, Labour Members have changed their political colours like the chameleons that they are. They claim to be able to run a capitalist system better than those who believe in it. But even in opposition Labour Members are beginning to find out that their conversion is incomplete. They keep reverting to socialist ideas and their rose is returning to the briar that it was. The suckers of socialism are sprouting everywhere, hence their £37 billion of spending commitments, which make them so antagonistic to the idea of tax cuts to restore consumer demand and lead us out of the recession.
The electorate will not be deceived. They will not be made into socialist suckers. The Labour party will be rejected as having no real remedies to deal with the recession or, indeed, any of our problems.

It being Ten o'clock, the motion for the Adjournment of the House lapsed, without Question put.

PETITION

Mifegyne

10 pm

Mr. Toby Jessel: I beg leave to present a petition signed by 324 of my constituents, led by Father Joseph Scally and Dr. Dermot Lynch of St. Theodore's Church, Hampton against the drug mifegyne.
The petition reads:
To the Honourable the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in Parliament assembled.
The Humble Petition of the people of the Parliamentary constituency of Twickenham Showeth That we the undersigned wish to note with regret that the Abortion Pill Mifegyne (known as 'RU486') has been granted a product licence.
We believe that drugs and medicines should be used only to save life. We deplore the fact that this drug causes the death of unborn human beings, and we express our grave concern that it will damage women physically and psychologically.
Wherefore, your Petitioners pray that your honourable House, which is committed to upholding respect for human life and protection of the weak and vulnerable, will do everything possible to prevent the distribution and use of mifegyne (known as RU486) and any other drugs which, like it, are produced with the deliberate intention of destroying innocent human life.
And your Petitioners, as in duty bound will ever pray, etc.

To lie upon the Table.

Hilda Lewis House

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. David Hunt.]

Mr. Dennis Canavan: I welcome the opportunity to raise the matter of Hilda Lewis house, which is on the verge of closure because of a decision taken by the Bethlem and Maudsley hospital special health authority.
Hilda Lewis house provides an intensive short-term in-patient assessment and intervention service for children who have severe learning difficulties and extreme behavioural problems, such as aggression to other people, or who injure themselves so severely that they can cause permanent damage. The aim of the staff at Hilda Lewis house is to help such children to lead as normal a life as possible. I am reliably informed by expert opinion that the treatment of such children needs to be carried out consistently on a 24 hours per day basis, which requires a high staff ratio.
Hilda Lewis house is a highly respected national resource offering residential treatment to children up to the age of 16 who have such severe problems that they cannot be adequately helped in a community setting. For most of those children, Hilda Lewis house is the last hope—the only answer. Without its help, they could end up under sedation in the wards of long-stay hospitals.
The excellent service provided by the staff was recognised by the previous Secretary of State for Health when he wrote to you, Mr. Speaker, in your constituency capacity, on 6 August 1990, stating:
I am confident that Hilda Lewis House will continue to provide the unique service which it offers. I have no reason to believe that the changes proposed by the Special Health Authority will in any way detract from its international reputation as a centre of excellence for the treatment of all kinds of psychiatric disorders.
In the same letter, he stated:
There is absolutely no intention to close the unit.
That was on 6 August 1990; yet only 17 months later, on 14 January this year, the special health authority decided to close in-patient services for children at Hilda Lewis house.
I understand that the remaining children at Hilda Lewis house were discharged last Friday without their treatment being completed. I should be grateful if the Minister would tell me exactly what has happened to those children. Are they merely being sent back to their families, or are any steps being taken to continue the treatment that they so evidently need?
Only a quarter of an hour or so ago, I met one of the children—a young lad called Simon, who was discharged last Friday and sent back to his parents. His mother and sisters have to look after him. I dare say that they will do their best, but they face an almost impossible situation without the essential back-up services that Simon had at Hilda Lewis house. It is a disgrace that in this day and age any child or young person such as Simon should be discharged without his therapy being completed. Will the Minister give me a case-by-case answer as to what has happened to all the children who were discharged last week without their treatment being completed?
In his recent letter to you, Mr. Speaker, which was dated 17 February, the Secretary of State, referring to Hilda Lewis house, said:

The in-patient service is not unique, with similar services in units around the country.
That seems to be a blatant contradiction of the statement made by the previous Secretary of State for Health when he referred to the "unique service" offered by Hilda Lewis house.
Mr. Eric Byers, the chief executive of the special health authority, agreed on the Radio 4 "Today" programme last month that there are no other similar national facilities. If there are similar services in units around the country—that now seems to be the view of the Department of Health —will the Minister name them? Where are those facilities? Is he absolutely confident that they offer the same type and quality of service as Hilda Lewis house? My information is that they do not, and that there is nowhere in the whole of the United Kingdom offering a similar service for such disturbed and deserving children and young people. I am assured that Hilda Lewis house is unique. Children are referred to it from all over Britain and from overseas, which is why it has such an excellent international reputation.
No justification has been given for its closure. In his recent letter to you, Mr. Speaker, the Secretary of State denied that Hilda Lewis house was being closed to provide a magnetic resonance imaging scanner. However, my information is that of the £250,000 that the authority hopes to save annually by the closure of Hilda Lewis house, £50,000 will go towards the purchase of a magnetic resonance imaging scanner although the cost-effectiveness of such a purchase has been questioned by several experts.
It seems that unless the closure decision is reversed, children from all over Britain will lose out. Irene Davis, whose son was receiving treatment at Hilda Lewis house, went so far as to say:
If the special health authority are saying goodbye to Hilda Lewis house then they are saying goodbye to the rest of my son's life.
In a letter to the hospital, Mrs. Davis wrote:
My 12-year-old son is autistic, and over the years he has gradually regressed, he has become extremely aggressive to the point of being too dangerous to stay at home, and yet the one thing I want most is for him to be a part of our family, but because of my four and two-year-olds I've had to ask HLH"—
that is, Hilda Lewis house—
to help, otherwise he would be permanently sent away from home. I don't want that. He is my child, and not an aggressive stranger.
HLH is really making headway with him, and he comes home to the family at weekends, and when they are finished with Paul, Paul will be part of our family with a future. You are taking that away from him, you are responsible for the fact that, due to this action, Paul and many children like him will be separated from their families indefinitely and probably locked away in so-called 'residential homes', which should be called 'institutions'. Well, I hope you can live with yourselves, knowing there are families and children going through incredible pain.
I hope that the Minister will bear those words in mind.
I dare say, Mr. Speaker, that in your time as a Member of Parliament and as Speaker you have often heard accusations, some justified and some perhaps not, of Government commitments having been broken. I have certainly heard many such accusations in my time as a Back Bencher, but I have never before come across a case in which a Minister has clearly broken a written commitment to the Speaker of the House of Commons. What is worse, no justification has been given for breaking


that commitment, and no adequate alternative provision has been made for the children who will suffer the consequences of an inhumane and deplorable decision.
I demand that the Minister intervene now, even at this late stage, and reverse the closure decision, for the sake of people such as Mrs. Davis and her son Paul, the young lad Simon, and all the other children who could benefit from the excellent service provided at Hilda Lewis house.

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Mr. Stephen Dorrell): The hon. Member for Falkirk, West (Mr. Canavan) is raising this matter for the second time in the House. He tabled a health question for oral answer last week, but it was not reached. I made a brief statement to him about the background to the decision to close Hilda Lewis house. My answer was necessarily brief, as it was an initial answer to what was intended to be an oral question, so I am grateful for the opportunity to explain to the House in more detail the background to that difficult decision.
Hilda Lewis house was created by, and was the responsibility of, the Bethlem and Maudsley special health authority which, as its name implies, plays a special role in the national health service. It has a special responsibility for the care of especially difficult cases involving psychiatric illness.
In London there are a number of such special health authorities within the health service. They have a particular responsibility for providing a research and development capability, postgraduate teaching and training, and a tertiary referral centre for difficult cases. In addition, the special health authority provides a range of local mental illness services. The case that the hon. Gentleman has made for the maintenance of the facility at Hilda Lewis house is based on its role as a tertiary referral centre for particularly difficult cases of young people suffering from a combination of psychiatric disorders and behavioural problems coupled with learning disabilities. That was the specialty for which Hilda Lewis house was designed. The facility provided five in-patient places and 10 day patient places. No one disputes that while it was open it performed valuable work providing care for patients and leading to better understanding within the profession and the health service of the treatment and care of such difficult cases.
Partly as a result of the experience and work at Hilda Lewis house, but more generally as well, thinking in the service about the best way of caring for and treating difficult psychiatric cases of people with learning disabilities has developed during the time when Hilda Lewis house was open. When, in June last year, the health advisory service and the social services inspectorate visited Hilda Lewis house to examine the facility, they said that the SHA should consider the future of the facility to see whether it still represented the best use of available resources. I take particularly seriously the opinion of the health advisory service, which has a monitoring responsibility for mental illness services throughout the NHS.
Those bodies pointed out that the emphasis on in-patient care at Hilda Lewis house was somewhat at variance with developing ideas about the proper way of caring for difficult people—with the stress now placed on providing a wide range of support in the community,

where possible, and at the very least—and however difficult the cases involved—on providing care for them as close as possible to the places where they live.
I do not claim—it is not true—that the HAS and the SSI said that there was no place for Hilda Lewis house, but they did say that the future of the facility should be considered. They recommended that the SHA consider whether it still represented as valuable a resource as it undoubtedly did the day it was opened and during the early part of its life.

Mr. Canavan: Saving money.

Mr. Dorrell: I shall come to that. I have looked in some detail into the background of this case, and I am totally confident that saving money does not constitute the background to it.
Following the report from the HAS and the SSI, the director of the facility left in the second half of last year. I am sure that we can all agree that when the specialist body responsible for monitoring mental illness services within the NHS had suggested that a review was necessary, it would have been a dereliction of duty if the SHA had not taken the opportunity provided by the director's leaving to conduct a review, as suggested by the SSI and the HAS, into the efficacy of the services provided at Hilda Lewis house.
When the director left, therefore, the SHA launched a review led not by managers and certainly not by politicians but by a joint committee of the special health authority—representing the centre of excellence for difficult psychiatric cases and the development of the psychiatric discipline in the health service—and the Institute of Psychiatry. The committee was to examine the use of resources at Hilda Lewis house. From a professional and not a managerial standpoint, the committee concluded that the SHA would use the resources better and provide a better quality of care for the people for whom, as the hon. Gentleman was right to stress, the NHS has an important responsibility to care. That committee decided that the resources could be better used.
Against that background, the hon. Gentleman asked me to intervene in the case. If I receive first from the HAS, then from a joint committee comprising the Institute of Psychiatry and the SHA and then ultimately from the SHA board—which is the properly constituted body for managing that centre of excellence within the health service—advice arguing that the resources would be better used on a different model and that the care needs of the client group for which the facility was established would be better met by different means, it would not be my place as a Minister with two years standing in the health service and a background in business—not psychiatry—to intervene and overrule a decision made by bodies with a pedigree in the psychiatric discipline which I cannot hope to match.
However, I can try to answer one or two of the specific points raised by the hon. Gentleman about the last in-patients who were discharged from Hilda Lewis house and some of the points made in the earlier letter from my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State for Education and Science when he was Secretary of State for Health.
The hon. Gentleman accurately quoted the letter from my right hon. and learned Friend in which he said that there were then no plans to close Hilda Lewis house. That


was perfectly true: there were no such plans. However, I have explained in some detail why the position of the SHA changed during the nine months beginning with the investigation by the HAS and the SSI, the findings of which were published last June. No hon. Member would argue that a commitment, albeit in an august letter from a Secretary of State to you, Mr. Speaker, that there was, as accurately stated then, no intention to close Hilda Lewis house, should bind the managers of the health service for ever, particularly if the managers receive advice from the psychiatrists and specialists in the field with the pedigree that I have described to the House.
Even though the undertaking was made in a letter to you, Mr. Speaker, I feel perfectly comfortable that the advice available—not to the Government, because this is not directly a Government decision—to the special health authority charged with managing that important national resource, and the circumstances have changed sufficiently for a decision to be reached that clearly contradicts the statement made by my right hon. and learned Friend when he was Secretary of State for Health some time ago.
The hon. Gentleman also asked whether we and the SHA recognised that the service provided at Hilda Lewis house was a national service. It is true that the services provided by any SHA are available to the whole NHS. It is part of the purpose of the SHA system that those authorities should develop the delivery of health care and that the results of their experience should be available widely through the health service. To that extent, the service provided at Hilda Lewis house was a national service. However, when we consider the pattern of where the patients came from, it is difficult to argue that Hilda Lewis house was a national service that was used throughout the country.
Between 1985 and 1991, 70 in-patients were cared for at Hilda Lewis house of whom 63 per cent.—very nearly two thirds—came from the South East Thames region in which Hilda Lewis house was located. Of the remainder, 16 per cent. came from South West Thames, which is the next nearest region, and only 21 per cent. of the total—15 cases—came from outside one of the two south Thames regions.
Against that background, I do not think that the case is made that that was a service of extensive value to the Trent region, for example, which covers my constituency, still less to the Scottish Home and Health Department, which covers the hon. Gentleman's constituency. However, that service undoubtedly performed valuable work for the people who went there, and it developed a better understanding of the care of those conditions, but I do not think that it was a resource that met a national need.

Mr. Canavan: The previous Secretary of State described it as a unique service. Is the Minister reneging on that statement? He has only five minutes in which to answer. What provision has been made for the children who were discharged last Friday? If it was a unique service, there is literally nowhere else for those children to go.

Mr. Dorrell: Those were to be my final two points to the hon. Gentleman. One was whether an alternative service of a similar type is available to meet that need elsewhere in the country. I am advised that two institutions offer similar

treatment for children who suffer from the combination of acute psychiatric conditions and learning difficulties. They are Harper house, which is in North West Thames region, and the Haven, which is in Paignton, in South Western region. Those facilities offer, I am advised, care that is comparable with that which was previously available at Hilda Lewis house.
I repeat that, bearing in mind the geographical home territory of the people who were treated at Hilda Lewis house, there is simply no support for the assertion that it was a national service. Certainly, there was learning which may be useful on a national scale—I do not dispute that—but I dispute that the service was uniformly available and used through the national health service.

Mr. Canavan: Do any of the places that the Minister has named offer 24-hour treatment combined with the assessment that was given at Hilda Lewis house?

Mr. Dorrell: Again, I am advised that the North West Thames, Northern and South-Western RHAs have a range of services that provide multi-disciplinary in-patient, out-patient community assessment and specialised consultancy for such patients. "In-patient" means residential care for those for whom it is most appropriate. I stress to the hon. Gentleman, as I have stressed to many audiences, both friendly and hostile, the health service's commitment to ensuring that, where possible, all people who suffer from a learning disability, and most particularly young people who suffer from a learning disability, are cared for in a domestic context and, where humanly possible, with their families. That is simply because the overwhelming weight of evidence is that, when that risk is taken and when that attempt is made, the outcome in terms of the lifestyle of the individual is dramatically better than is possible in an in-patient context. There are repeated examples of patients surprising themselves, their families and professional staff by what they are able to do when supported in that context.
I now refer to the hon. Gentleman's question about the three patients who were discharged last Friday. I remind the House that the closure of that facility did not involve a massive dislocation; it involved the relocation of three patients—all of them individuals with the right to expect that we discharge a proper responsibility of care for them. I am advised that two of the existing patients, one from Waltham Forest and one from Worthing, were already in local authority care and have returned to respite care in their home areas. The third has returned to his home in the Oxford area while a suitable placement nearer home is found. The SHA continues, because we are talking about the closure of only a tiny part of its activity. It will use some of the money that is released by the closure of Hilda Lewis house to ensure that there is proper follow-up of not only those three cases but all the cases that stand to benefit from the type of services offered through that important centre of excellence.
The centre of excellence is the SHA. It has a deep and continuing commitment to continue to improve the quality of care available in the health service for this type of patient. It is its professional judgment that such care is best delivered by following the route that it has set out.

Mr. Canavan: Why were the children discharged before the treatment was completed?

Mr. Dorrell: As I have said, the treatment of such conditions by its nature is never completed. We seek to ensure that for all discharged patients there is follow-up

and that continuing care which meets their needs is available. That is the commitment which I have given and repeat and which the health authority has given.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at half-past Ten o'clock.